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A LITERARY HISTORY OF ENGLAND

VOLUME I
The Middle Ages (to 1500)

KEMP MALONE
Johns Hopkins University
ALBERT C.BAUGH
University of Pennsylvania
VOLUME II
The Renaissance (15001660)

TUCKER BROOKE
MATTHIAS A.SHAABER
University of Pennsylvania
VOLUME III
The Restoration and Eighteenth Century (16601789)

GEORGE SHERBURN
DONALD F.BOND
The University of Chicago
VOLUME IV
The Nineteenth Century and After (17891939)

SAMUEL C.CHEW
RICHARD D.ALTICK
The Ohio State University

Second Edition
Edited by Albert C.Baugh
VOLUME I
THE
MIDDLE AGES
The Old English Period (to 1100)
KEMP MALONE
&
The Middle English Period (11001500)
ALBERT C.BAUGH
London and New York
First published in Great Britain

by Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd
Second Edition 1967
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
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Copyright 1967 by Meredith Publishing Company
Copyright 1948 by Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form
without the permission of the publisher, except for
the quotation of brief passages in criticism
ISBN 0-203-39273-6 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-203-39556-5 (Adobe eReader Format)

ISBN 0-415-04557-6 (Print Edition)
Preface to the First Edition

The purpose of the work of which the present volume forms a part is to
provide a comprehensive history of the literature of England, an account that
is at once scholarly and readable, capable of meeting the needs of mature
students and of appealing to cultivated readers generally. While the literature
of England is commonly thought of as literature in English, it is not likely
that any one will quarrel with the fact that some mention is made of writings
in Latin and French during the medieval period, at a time when these
languages served as vernaculars for certain classes. The Latin writings of the
Renaissance and later periods, however, have been omitted for lack of space.
Nor will any one object to the inclusion of Scottish and Irish writers who do
not belong geographically to England. Custom sufficiently sanctions
including them. The original plan brought the history to an end with the year
1939 (the outbreak of the Second World War); but delay in publication
caused by the war has permitted reference to a few events of a date
subsequent to 1939.
The extent of English literature is so great that no one can hope to read
more than a fraction of it, and the accumulated scholarshipbiographical,
critical, and historicalby which writers and their works, and the forms and
movements and periods of English literature have been interpreted, is so vast
that no single scholar can control it. A literary history of England by one
author, a history that is comprehensive and authoritative over the whole
field, is next to impossible. Hence, the plan of the present work. A general
harmony of treatment among the five contributors, rather than rigid
uniformity of plan, has seemed desirable, and there is quite properly some
difference of emphasis in different sections. Thus, there is more of strictly
philological matter in the section on Old English literature, and more of
political, economic, and social history in the treatment of the Nineteenth
Century and After. It is hoped that the approach to the different sections will
seem to be that best suited to the literature concerned.
Since it is expected that those who read this history or consult it will wish
for further acquaintance with the writings and authors discussed, it has been
a part of the plan to draw attention, by the generous use of footnotes, to
standard editions, to significant biographical and critical works, and to the
most important books and articles in which the reader may pursue further
the matters that interest him. A few references to very recent publications
have been added in proof in an effort to record the present state of scholarly
and critical opinion.
v
vi
PREFACE
It is a pleasure for the authors of the present volume to record their special
obligations. Professor Arthur G.Brodeur has read most of the Old English
section. The late Professor Clarence G.Child and Professor MacEdward Leach
read the Middle English portion, Dr. Hope Emily Allen the chapters on the
Ancrene Riwle and Richard Rolle, Professor William Roach the chapters on
Arthurian romance. To these scholars the authors express their warm sense
of appreciation.
K.M.
A.C.B.
NOTE TO SECOND EDITION

The reception of the Literary History of England has been so gratifying as to
call for a number of successive printings, and these have permitted minor
corrections to be made. The present edition has a further aimto bring the
book in line with the most recent scholarship. Small changes have been made
in the plates wherever possible, but most of the additions, factual and
bibliographical, are recorded in a Supplement. The text, Supplement, and
Index are correlated by means of several typographical devices. Explanations
of these devices appear on each part-title page as well as at the beginning of
the Supplement and the Index.
The editor regrets that the authors of Books II, III, and IV did not live to
carry out the revisions of those books, but their places have been ably taken
by the scholars whose names appear with theirs in the list of collaborators. It
has been the desire of the editor, as well as of those who have joined him, that
each of these books should remain essentially as the original author wrote it,
and we believe that other scholars would concur. Any new points of view, it
is hoped, are adequately represented in the Supplement,
A.C.B.
Contents
PAGE
Preface to the First Edition

Note to Second Edition
List of Abbreviations
PART I.
v
vi
viii
THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD (TO 1100)
CHAPTER
I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII.
VIII.
IX.
X.
Folk, State, and Speech

Anglo-Latin Writings
The Old Tradition: Poetic Form
The Old Tradition: Popular Poetry
The Old Tradition: Courtly Poetry
Religious Poetry: Cdmon and His School
Religious Poetry: Cynewulf and His School
Religious Poetry: Poems on Various Themes
Secular Poetry
Literary Prose
PART II.
I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII.
VIII.
IX.
X.
XI.
XII.
XIII.
XIV.
XV.
XVI.
XVII.
XVIII.
XIX.
XX.
XXI.
3
12
20
32
45
60
70
78
88
96
THE MIDDLE ENGLISH PERIOD (11001500)
General Characteristics of the Period

The Survival of the Native Tradition (11001250)
The Ancrene Riwle
Anglo-Norman Literature
Early Latin Writers
Wit and Wisdom
For Their Souls Need
The Arthurian Legend to Layamon
The Romance: I
The Romance: II
The Omnibus of Religion
The Lyric
Richard Rolle and Other Mystics
The Alliterative Revival
Piers Plowman and Other Alliterative Poems
Chaucer: I
Chaucer: II
Other Contemporaries of Chaucer
The Beginnings of the Drama
Ebb Tide
Looking Forward
Bibliographical Supplement
Index
109
117
127
135
143
152
158
165
173
185
200
208
225
232
240
249
258
264
273
288
300
313
343
vii
List of Abbreviations
AJP
Archiv
ARS
CBEL
American Journal of Philology

Archiv fr das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen
Augustan Reprint Society
Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature (4V, Cambridge, 1941)
CFMA
Les Classiques franais du moyen ge
CHEL
Cambridge History of English Literature (14V, 190717)
CL
Comparative Literature
E&S
Essays and Studies by Members of the English Association
EETS
Early English Text Society, Original Series
EETSES
Early English Text Society, Extra Series
EHR
English Historical Review
EIC
Essays in Criticism
ELH
ELH, A Journal of English Literary History
ELN
English Language Notes
EML Series English Men of Letters Series
ES
English Studies
ESt
Englische Studien
GR
Germanic Review
HLQ
Huntington Library Quarterly
Hist. Litt.
Histoire littraire de la France (38v, 17331941, in progress)
JAAC
Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism
JEGP
Journal of English and Germanic Philology
JHI
Journal of the History of Ideas
KSJ
Keats-Shelley Journal
LTLS
(London) Times Literary Supplement
MA
Medium vum
MLN
Modern Language Notes
MLQ
Modern Language Quarterly
MLR
Modern Language Review
MP
Modern Philology
N&Q
Notes and Queries
NCF
Nineteenth-Century Fiction
PMLA
Publications of the Modern Language Association of America
PQ
Philological Quarterly
viii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
REL
RES
RLC
RR
SAB
SATF
SEL
SF&R
ShS
SP
SQ
SRen
STS
UTQ
VP
VS
Review of English Literature

Review of English Studies
Revue de littrature compare
Romanic Review
Shakespeare Association Bulletin
Societ des anciens textes franais
Studies in English Literature, 15001900 (Rice Univ.)
Scholars Facsimiles and Reprints
Shakespeare Survey
Studies in Philology
Shakespeare Quarterly
Studies in the Renaissance
Scottish Text Society
University of Toronto Quarterly
Victorian Poetry
Victorian Studies
ix
BOOK I
The Middle Ages
PART I
The Old English Period
(to 1100)
Guide to reference marks

Throughout the text of this book, a point set beside a page number
indicates that references to new critical material will be found under an
identical paragraph/page number (set in boldface) in the BIBLIOGRAPHICAL
SUPPLEMENT.
In the Index, a number preceded by an S indicates a paragraph/page number
in the BIBLIOGRAPHICAL SUPPLEMENT.
I1
Folk, State, and Speech
England and the English, state and folk,2 are not old as historians reckon
time. Tacitus set down the English name, it is true, as early as A.D. 98, but
the Anglii of the Germania3 were only a Germanic tribe of the Jutland
peninsula, politically independent but culturally part of a nationality, not yet
a nationality in their own right. They won cultural independence and national
status by migration. In the fifth and sixth centuries of our era the Angles, like
many another Germanic tribe of that day, gave up their old seats and sought
land and loot within the bounds of the Roman Empire. If Bede is right, the
whole tribe left home in this migration, and parts of at least two neighboring
tribes, the Saxons and the Jutes, took ship in the same move.4 All three
tribes settled anew in the Roman province of Britannia, the eastern half of
which they overran, from the Channel to the Firth of Forth. The western
half held out longer against them, though without help from Rome, who
had withdrawn her legions from Britannia one after another until, early in
the fifth century, the land was left stripped of troops. Not until the ninth
century did Cornwall yield to English arms, and further north the Welsh
kept their freedom, more or less, until 1282, over 200 years after the English
lost theirs at Hastings. But by the end of the sixth century most of the
geographical area now known as England had fallen into the hands of
1
Bibliography: A.H.Heusinkveld and E.J.Bashe, A Bibliographical Guide to Old English, Univ. of
Iowa Humanistic Studies, iv, 5 (Iowa City, 1931); see also the Old English section (I. 51110) of the
CBEL, and W.L.Renwick and H.Orton, The Beginnings of English Literature to Skelton (1940), pp.
133252. Literary history: recent works are E.E.Wardales Chapters on Old English Literature (1935)
and C.W.Kennedys The Earliest English Poetry (1943); an older work, S.A.Brookes English Literature
from the Beginning to the Norman Conquest (1898). The best treatment remains A.Brandls Englische
Literatur, in H.Pauls Grundriss der germ. Philologie, 2ed., II. Band, I. Abteilung, VI. Abschnitt
(Strassburg, 1908), a work which, in spite of its title, deals almost wholly with Old English; also issued
separately under the title Geschichte der altenglischen Literatur. Poetic texts: the corpus of Old English
poetry was first edited by C.W.M.Grein, under the title Bibliothek der ags. Poesie; R.P.Wlckers rev.
ed. of this (18831898) is still standard; it is cited sometimes as Grein-Wlcker, sometimes as Wlcker
or Wlker; a new collection in six volumes, The Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, edited by G.P.Krapp and
E.V.K.Dobbie, begun in 1932, was completed in 1953; we cite it as Krapp-Dobbie. Prose texts: the
corpus of Old English prose still wants collecting, though a number of texts have been published in the
Bibl. der ags. Prosa, the Early English Text Society series, and elsewhere.
2
Political history: F.M.Stenton, Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 1943); see also R.G. Collingwood
and J.N.L.Myres, Roman Britain and the English Settlements (Oxford, 1936); R.H.Hodgkin, A History
of the Anglo-Saxons [to A.D. 900] (2V, Oxford, 1935); Charles Oman, England before the Norman
Conquest (1910).
3
Cap. 40; cf. K.Malone, Namn och Bygd. XXII (1934). 2651.
4
Hist. Eccl. I. 15. The j of Jutes (from Bedes Iutae) is in origin a blunder, by confusion of t and j.
A better form would be Iuts or Euts, but these forms are current among the learned only.
Migration
to
Britain
New
Units
Rise
of the
Unified
State
THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD
the Germanic tribesmen, and these, whatever their tribe, had begun to think
of themselves as members of a larger unit, a new nationality which went by
the English name. The old tribal name Angl(i)i in its extended or generic
sense, denoting the Germanic inhabitants of Britain irrespective of tribe, first
appears in the writings of Pope Gregory the Great (d.604).5 The rise of this
national name marks the beginnings of English national (as distinct from
tribal) feeling.
By this time, indeed, the tribes no longer existed as such. When the Roman
mission which Gregory had sent out reached England in the year 597, the
missionaries did not find any tribal organizations of Angles, Saxons, and Jutes;
they found a number of kingdoms, each autonomous but those south of the
Humber drawn together, loosely enough, through their recognition of the
imperium or overlordship of the reigning king of Kent. Earlier holders of such a
personal imperium had been a king of Sussex and a king of Wessex, and later
holders would be kings of various realms north and south of the Humber, until in
the ninth century King Egbert would win it permanently for the royal house of
Wessex.6 We know nothing of the political connections of the various Germanic
settlements in Britain before the rise of the first imperium, but we have little
reason to think that any tribal organization, as such, outlived the migration from
Germany. It seems altogether likely that the settlements started their respective
careers as mutually independent political units, and that the tribal affiliations of
given migrants or groups of migrants had little practical importance even at the
time of migration, and soon became a matter of antiquarian and sentimental
interest only.7 No tribal loyalties, therefore, stood in the way of the English
nationalism which, by virtue of geographical and cultural community, early came
into being. On the religious side, moreover, this nationalism was fostered, not
hindered, by the conversion to Christianity in the seventh century: the Roman
missionaries organized a Church of England, not separate churches of Kent,
Wessex, and the like, and in the year 664, at the synod of Whitby, the Romanizers,
led by Wilfrid of York, won the field over their Irish rivals, ensuring thereby the
religious unification of all England in a single Church.8
On the political side, it is true, English nationalism could hardly win
much ground so long as the various kingdoms kept their autonomy, subject
only to the shifting imperium of one or another of the many royal houses.
But this particularistic system of government broke down for good and all
in the ninth and tenth centuries. In the ninth Egbert set up and Alfred
5
The Pope presumably had the term, directly or indirectly, from the English themselves. Certainly
Saxones was the generic term current among the insular Celts, and on the Continent, in and before
Gregorys day, and in setting this old and familiar term aside in favor of Angli, Gregory must have been
trying to conform to English usage (which with good reason might be held authoritative here). The
Popes example was followed by Gregory of Tours and other writers of the seventh and eighth centuries.
6
Bede, op. cit., II. 5; see also OE Annals under A.D. 827. With the imperium went the title Bretwalda
ruler of Britain.
7
Cf. J.N.L.Myres, in Roman Britain and the English Settlements, pp. 347348.
8
See S.J.Crawford, Anglo-Saxon Influence on Western Christendom (Oxford, 1933), pp. 4849;
cf. J.L.G.Meissner, Celtic Church in England after the Synod of Whitby (1929).
FOLK, STATE, AND SPEECH
clinched the overlordship of the kings of Wessex, while in the tenth these kings
took for title Rex Anglorum King of the English. The other royal houses
died out or lost their kingly rank and function; Alfreds followers on the throne
won back the Danelaw; the former English and Danish kingdoms in Britain
became mere provinces of a kingdom of England; in sum, an English nation
replaced the old imperium. The political nationalism which grew up hand in
hand with the new nation found focus, naturally enough, in the person of the
king, and to this day English patriotism has not lost its association with the
crown. But this is not the place to tell the tale of English nationalism in the
tenth and eleventh centuries.9 It will be enough to mention one of its many
fruits, the Kings English or standard written speech which had grown current
all over England by the end of the tenth century. In this form of Old English
nearly all the vernacular writings of the period were set down, and the scribes,
in copying older writings, usually made them conform to the new standard of
speech, though they might let an old spelling, here and there, go unchanged.
England, with its national king (descendant of Alfred, the national hero),
its national Church (founded by a papal mission and in communion with
Rome), its national speech (the Kings English), and its old and rich national
literature, stood unique in the Europe of the year 1000. No other modern
European state reached full nationhood so early. And yet this English
nationhood did not come too soon. Indeed, if it had not been reached early it
might not have been reached at all, for the eleventh was a century of political
disaster. The state succumbed to foreign foes, and for more than 200 years of
French rule the only weapon left to the English was the strong nationalism
handed down to them from the golden days of the past. But for this
nationalism, the English language in particular would hardly have survived
as such, though it might have lingered on for centuries in the form of mutually
unintelligible peasant dialects, and with the triumph of French speech England
would have become a cultural if not political province of France, doomed to
a fate not unlike that which in later times actually befell Ireland at English
hands. The nationalism which saved England from such a fate owed much of
its strength, of course, to the rich literary culture of the centuries before
Hastings, a culture marked from the beginning by free use of the mother
tongue (alongside Latin) as a medium of expression. To this mother tongue,
and to the literature of which it was the vehicle, let us now turn.10
English history (as distinguished from prehistory) begins in the year 597.
The Roman and Irish missionaries taught the English to make those written
records from which the historians glean their knowledge of early England
9
The tale is told by R.W.Chambers, EETS, 186 (1932). lxilxxx. See also Chambers, Mans
Unconquerable Mind (1939), pp. 7087. Chambers fails to point out that Old English nationalism was
summed up and given official expression in the legal formula an Christendom and an cynedom fre on
eode one Church and one state always in the land. See F.Liebermann, Gesetze der Angelsachsen, I
(1903). 385.
10
A standard guide to the language of the period is the Old English Grammar of J. and E. M.Wright
(3ed., Oxford, 1925).
The
Mother
Tongue
Related
Tongues
Latin
and the particular records written in the vernacular give us our earliest
documentation of the mother tongue. Then as now this tongue went by the
English name.11 Its nearest kinsman was the speech of the Frisians. Closely
kindred tongues, too, were Saxon and Franconian (or Frankish), the two
main dialects of Low German.12 The dialects of High German, and those of
Scandinavian, had features which made their kinship to English less close.
English was akin to all these neighboring tongues, and to Gothic, in virtue of
common descent from Germanic, a language which we know chiefly through
its offspring, as it had split up into dialects at a date so early that the records
of it in its original or primitive state are few. Germanic in turn was an offshoot
of Indo-European, a hypothetical tongue which we know only through the
many languages which are descended from it. To the Indo-European family
of languages belonged, not only English and the other children of Germanic,
but also Latin (with its offspring, the Romance languages), Greek, the various
Celtic and Slavic languages, Persian, Sanskrit (with other languages of India),
Armenian, Albanian, Lithuanian, Latvian, etc.13 Here, however, the kinship
is so remote that it is overshadowed by a connection of another kind: a
fellowship, so to speak. Latin, for instance, is only remotely linked to English
by common descent from Indo-European, but it is closely linked to English
by common participation in European life. The fellowship between English
and Latin, it must be added, has always been one-sided; Latin has done the
giving, English the taking, and this because Latin, the language of the Church
and the vehicle of classical culture, had much to give and found little if anything
that it needed to take.14
That English has many words taken from Latin is a fact familiar to
everyone. Such words began coming in even before the migration to Britain
(e.g., street and cook), and they have kept coming in ever since. Less
familiar, perhaps, are the so-called semantic borrowings: native words with
meanings taken from Latin. Two examples will have to serve: god-spell
11
Throughout historical times the adj. English (used in the absolute construction) has been the
regular name for the language spoken by the Germanic inhabitants of Britain. From the seventeenth
century onward, the adj. Anglo-Saxon (a learned coinage of modern times) has had more or less currency
as a synonym of English; among scholars it was commonly used to denote the earliest forms of English,
but this meaning has never become familiar to the general public, and most scholars now call the
language in all stages by the name which it has always had among those who spoke it: namely, English.
See K.Malone, RES, v (1929). 173185. When qualification by period is thought needful, a suitable
qualifying term may be prefixed. See K.Malone, English Journal, College Edition, XIX (1930). 639
651. The usual division by periods gives Old English (beginnings to 1100), Middle English (1100 to
1500), and Modern English (1500 to present day). Linguistically speaking, this division is not accurate,
but all divisions in the nature of the case are more or less arbitrary.
12
The chief modern representatives of the Franconian dialect of Low German are Dutch and Flemish.
13
The traditional classification here followed is figurative (for a language is no plant or animal and
neither begets nor brings forth offspring). Classification in biological terms, moreover, like any other
way of ordering phenomena, stresses some features at the cost of others. If, however, we bear all this
in mind, we may accept the linguistic family tree as a legitimate device, serving a useful purpose.
14
Here we must distinguish between classical and medieval Latin. The former took nothing from
English; the latter (more precisely, that variety of medieval Latin current in England) became more or
less colored, in time, by its English setting.
(modern gospel), literally good news, is a translation of Latin evangelium

(itself taken from Greek), and its meaning is restricted accordingly; ing
(modern thing) originally had in common with Latin res the meaning (legal)
dispute, lawsuit, whereupon, in virtue of the equation thus set up, other
meanings of res came to be given to the Old English word, including the
meaning most common today.15 But the fellowship with Latin affected English
idiom and style as well as vocabulary; thus, the Latin mundo uti live
reappears in the worolde brucan of Beowulf.
The fellowship of English with French began much later (toward the end
of the Old English period), but has proved just as lasting, and French comes
next to Latin in the list of foreign tongues that have set their mark on English
speech. The only other important medieval fellowship was that with Danish
(as it was then called) or Scandinavian (as we call it now). Here matters were
complicated by the kinship of the two tongues. Both Danish and English
went back to Germanic, and often one could not tell whether a given word
was native English or of Viking importation, so much alike were the two
languages. The Scandinavian origin of many of our most familiar words,
however, can be proved by earmarks of one kind or another (e.g., sky and
take). The fellowship with Danish, beginning in the ninth century, was at its
height in the tenth and eleventh; after that it lessened, and though it never
died out it has. played only a small part in modern times.
Fellowship with foreign tongues is no peculiarity of English; all languages
have connections of this kind, though some are more friendly than others.
Such fellowships markedly affect the stock of words (including formative
prefixes and suffixes), but as a rule leave almost or altogether unchanged the
sounds and inflexions. Their effect on syntax, idiom, and style is hard to
assess with precision. In the Old World of medieval times, four great linguistic
cultural empires flourished side by side: Latin, Arabic, Sanskrit, and Chinese.16
The languages of western Europe (whether Celtic, Germanic or Romanic)
gave their allegiance to Latin, and English yielded with the rest,17 but the
Latinizing forces did not reach the height of their power in English until the
Middle Ages were dead and gone. The medieval Englishman, meekly though
he bowed before imperial speech, clung stubbornly to his linguistic heritage.
So much for externals. What of the mother tongue in its own right?
Texts written partly or wholly in English (including glosses) have come
down to us from the seventh century onward, and by the eleventh their
number has greatly grown. From them we learn that the language was not
uniform throughout the country but fell into dialects. Our records show four
main dialects: one northern, commonly called Northumbrian; one midland,
known as Mercian; and two southern, Kentish and West Saxon. The
15
These and other examples may be found in S.Kroeschs paper, Semantic Borrowing in Old
English, Studiesin honor of Frederick Klaeber (Minneapolis, 1929), pp. 5072.
16
Greek had a medieval empire too, but it was a mere shadow of its Hellenistic self.
17
Of all the western tongues, Icelandic alone held out against Latinization.
French
Danish
Dialects
The Place
of Old
English
Independence
Simplified
Forms
last of these is abundantly represented in the texts; it served as a basis for

standard Old English speech. The other dialects are recorded rather meagerly,
but the texts we have are enough to give us some idea of the dialectal
distinctions. Other dialects than these presumably existed, but for want of
texts we know little or nothing about them. The Old English dialects, unlike
their descendants, the dialects of modern times, had undergone no great
differentiation, and their respective speakers understood each other with ease.
The Old English standardization of speech came about, not from any linguistic
need but as a by-product and symbol of national unity: the Kings English
won for itself a prestige that proved overwhelming.
We shall not undertake to give in this history a detailed or even a
systematic description of Old English speech. We shall do no more than
mark, as best we can, where Old English stands on the road from Germanic
times to the twentieth century. Here the classical or standard speech of
A.D. 1000 will serve as our basis of comparison, and we shall compare this
stage of Old English with primitive Germanic on the one hand and current
English on the other. With our terms so defined, the temporal place of Old
English is midway between Germanic and the speech of today. But mere
lapse of time means little, since the tempo of change varies markedly down
the years. Let us look at a few particulars each for itself. And first the
matter of differentiation.
In the year 100, Germanic was already split up into dialects, but these
dialects had not yet grown far apart, and the unity of the language was still
unbroken. More precisely, the Anglo-Frisian or proto-English dialect had no
independent existence, but was merely a regional form of Germanic. By the
year 1000 a revolutionary change had taken place. English had become a
language in its own right, fully developed and self-sufficient; in the process it
had grown so unlike its Continental kinsmen that their respective speakers
could not understand each other. No comparable change took place after the
year 1000; since that date the language has simply kept the independence
which it earlier won. In other words, the differentiation of English from the
other Germanic tongues, a process which has been going on without a break
for some 1500 years, was of the utmost importance in its early stages, but
became relatively unimportant after English won its independence and
established itself as a going concern. In the matter of differentiation, then,
the fundamental changes took place in the first, not in the second of our two
periodsbefore, not after A.D. 1000.
Next we take up the simplification of the inflexional system. Germanic
was a highly inflected speech; Germanic and Latin were at about the same
stage or level of inflexional complexity. Modern English, on the other
hand, has a rather simple inflexional system and relies largely on word
order and particles, devices not unknown to Germanic but less important
than they are today in expressing syntactical relationships. How far had
simplification gone by the year 1000? Among the nouns it had gone pretty
far, though grammatical gender did not break down until Middle English
times. 18 Among the adjectives, simplification went more slowly: the

elaborate double system of adjectival inflexion characteristic of Germanic
and kept to this day in German was kept in Old English too, and was not
wholly given up until the fifteenth century. Much the same may be said of
the demonstratives: that in Old English still had twelve forms as against
the three current today (the, that, those),19 and this still had ten forms as
against the two of today (this, these). In the inflexion of the personal
pronouns, however, the beginnings of the modern three-case system appear
as early as the text of Beowulf, where we find the datives me, e, him
used now and then as accusatives; thus, him thrice occurs in accusative
constructions (lines 963, 2377, 2828). This use led later to the loss of the
personal (and interrogative) accusative forms, the old dative forms doing
duty for both cases. 20 The Germanic system of verb inflexion also
underwent marked simplification in Old English.21
This loss or reduction of many inflexional endings did not occur as a
strictly inflexional change, but made part of a change much wider in scope,
and phonetic rather than inflexional in kind. English shared with the other
Germanic tongues a system of pronunciation by which the first syllable of
a word was stressed at the expense of the other syllables;22 these, by
progressive weakening, underwent reduction or were lost. Most of the many
monosyllabic words in Old English go back to Germanic words of two or
more syllables, and most of the dissyllabic words go back to Germanic
polysyllables. The tendency to reduce or get rid of the unstressed syllables
set in more than once in Old English times; thus, the so-called Middle English
leveling of the inflexional endings actually took place in the tenth century,
though traditional spelling kept the old distinctions in the texts (more or
18
Nearly all Old English nouns belonged to one of three declensions: a-stems, o-stems and nstems. In the plural all these had a three-case system of inflexion: one form for the nom. and acc., one
for the gen. and one for the dat. (Modern English has a two-case system: one form for nom. dat. acc.,
another form for gen.). In the singular, the -stems had a three-case inflexion parallel to that of the
plural. (Modern English likewise has a two-case system parallel to that of the plural). The other two
declensions, however, had a two-case inflexion of the singular: one form marked the nom., the other
the oblique case. (The neuter n-stem nouns had a different two-case system: one form for the nom.
acc., the other for gen. dat.). Moreover, by the year 1000 the distinction between nom. and oblique
had been lost in the singular of o-stems, and tended to be lost in the singular of n-stems. The consequent
inability of speakers to make case distinctions in these declensions may have had something to do with
the Middle English tendency to give a-stem. inflexion to the o-stem and n-stem nouns. At any rate, this
tendency existed and was carried through (to the incidental destruction of grammatical gender), and
the modern inflexion of nouns is only a somewhat simplified form of the old a-stem inflexion. Other
Germanic declensions, of which only remnants or traces appear in Old English, were i-stems, u-stems,
s-stems, r-stems, -stems, nd-stems, and monosyllabic consonant stems.
19
But the indeclinable definite article the occurs in Old English times (notably in annal 963 of the
Laud text of the Annals).
20
But the neut. acc. forms hit and hwt were kept, and did duty for the dat. as well.
21
Thus, the passive was lost, except for the form hatte; the dual was lost; the three persons were no
longer distinguished except in the indicative singular, and even here only in the present tense (in the
preterit the second person had a distinctive form, but the first and third persons were identical).
22
But the inseparable preverbs did not take the stress (e.g., be in becuman become), and the
prefixes be-, for-, and ge-, whether used as preverbs or not, usually lost whatever accent they may once
have had (e.g., forbod prohibition).
Stress
10
Stock of
Words
less) for 200 years thereafter. Nor did the year 1000 mark the end of such
changes; the tendency has kept up to this day. It goes with our emphatic or
dynamic style of utterance, a style which strengthens the strong and weakens
the weak to gain its characteristic effects. The rhythm of English speech has
always been apt for emphasis, but has lent itself less readily to indifference.
In the quietest of conversations the points still come too strong for a really
smooth flow; the dynamic style natural to the language makes itself felt in
spite of everything. Perhaps the likewise hoary English taste for litotes has
had the function of neutralizing the emphasis with which even an
understatement must be uttered. And the quiet low voice which the English
take such pains to cultivate may have a like function. In Old English verse the
dynamic quality of ordinary speech rhythm was sharpened by alliteration
and reinforced by an ictus which (unlike that of Latin verse) never did violence
to the natural stress pattern. In effect the verse rhythm was a heightened
prose rhythm; by virtue of this heightening, the words of the poet gained in
strength and worth.
Finally we come to the development of the English vocabulary. Germanic
was a speech well suited to those who spoke it, but its stock of words fell
woefully short of meeting the needs of a civilized people. Many new scientific,
technical, and learned terms had to be coined by the English after their conversion
to Christianity and their adoption of that civilization which the missionaries
brought up from the south. Indeed, the change from barbarism to civilization
had marked effects on every aspect of English life, and names had to be found
for all the new things that kept pouring in. The English rose magnificently to
the occasion. They gave new meanings to old words, and made new words by
the thousand. A good many Latin words were taken over bodily, but most of
the new words were coinages, minted from the native wordstock whether
inspired by Latin models or of native inspiration.23 This creative linguistic activity
made English an instrument of culture equal to the needs of the time. By the
year 1000, this new-comer could measure swords with Latin in every department
of expression, and was incomparably superior to the French speech that came
in with William of Normandy.24 But the shift from English to French in cloister
23
On the Old English wordstock, see A.C.Baugh, History of the English Language (1935), pp. 75
80 and 101110. Note also Professor O.Vocadlos characterization of Old English: The language of
Wessex as it was developed by Alfred and his followers was certainly the most refined and cultured
speech among all early Teutonic dialects. With its rich vocabulary, which conformed to a Latin
pattern in the formation of native abstract words and was a fit tool even for the subtleties of philosophical
and theological thought, [it] was no doubt the only fully developed vernacular language in Europe: the
only medieval language which at an early period developed a remarkable nomenclature of science,
religion and philosophy out of its own resources (Studies in English by Members of the English
Seminar of the Charles University, Prague, 1933, p. 62).
24
Sir James Murray, in The Evolution of English Lexicography (1900), p. 14, puts the matter thus:
In literary culture the Normans were as far behind the people whom they conquered as the Romans
were when they made themselves masters of Greece. Not until the twelfth century did the development
of French into a literary language get well under way. In other important aspects of culture, too, the
English were ahead of the Normans. As R.W. Chambers points out, in his Continuity of English Prose
(1932), the Norman conquerors were amazed at the wealth of precious things they found in England
a land which in that respect, they said, surpassed Gaul many times over. England reminded them of
11
and hall brought about a great cultural decline among the hapless English,
and when their speech at last rose again in the world it had been stripped of
much of its cultural freight and now turned to Latin or French for words that
it would never have needed if only it could have kept its own. By turning to
foreign stores the language built up anew its lessened word stock, but at
heavy cost. From that day to this it has gone the easy way, borrowing from
others instead of doing its own creative work, until its muscles have become
flabby for want of exercise, while the enormous and ever increasing mass of
foreign matter taken into its system has given it a chronic case of linguistic
indigestion.
In sum, the English language became a vehicle of civilization in Old English
times, but during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the great medieval
centuries, it lost rather than gained cultural ground, and its remarkable
recovery in the fourteenth and succeeding centuries took place in such a way
that permanent damage was done. Thanks to this recovery, English has kept
its function as a vehicle of civilization, but in so doing it was merely holding
fast to an Old English inheritance. Today we carry on, but we owe our cultural
tradition to the pathfinding work of the men of oldest England.
what they had heard of the riches of Byzantium or the East. A Greek or a Saracen would have been
astonished, said William of Poitiers, at the artistic treasures of England (p. lxx). Again, English
jewellery, metal-work, tapestry and carving were famed throughout Western Europe. English
illumination was unrivalled, Even in stone-carving, those who are competent to judge speak of the
superiority of the native English carver over his Norman supplanter (ibid., p. lxxvii). The verdict of
one of those who are competent to judge reads thus: in the minor arts the Norman conquest was
little short of a catastrophe, blotting out alike a good tradition and an accomplished execution, and
setting in its place a semi-barbaric art which attempted little and did that little ill (A.W.Clapham,
English Romanesque Architecture before the Conquest [1930], p. 77). See also M.Schapiro, Gazette des
Beaux-Arts, VI Series, XXIII (1943). 146.
Summary
II
Anglo-Latin Writings
Composition in a foreign tongue has always been something of a tour de
force. Few people ever master a language not their own, and writings done in
an alien speech rarely rise above the level of school exercises. Now and then
some genius transcends these limitations, but, even so, his work usually
remains an aesthetic curiosity, of little consequence in the literary scheme of
things. The Anglo-Latin writings1 which we shall now take up make no
exception to the general rule. They have their importance in the history of
English culture, but they cannot be reckoned triumphs of literary art.
The custom of composing in Latin came to England with the missionaries
of the Church, and the English converts (more precisely, those of them in
training for holy orders) learned to read and write Latin as part of their
professional education. Christianity, though Jewish in origin, had grown up
in the Hellenistic world, and Greek accordingly became the language of the
early Church. In the course of the third century, however, this linguistic unity
was lost: Greek, kept in the east, yielded to Latin in the west as the masses
there gradually gave up their native tongues and took the idiom of their
Roman rulers. Into this lingua franca of the west St. Jerome translated the
Bible; in this common speech his contemporary St. Augustine of Hippo2 and
other Church fathers wrote. By A.D. 597, when the conversion of the English
began, a rich Christian literature in the Latin tongue had come into being.
The Church made this literature accessible to the converts, along with secular
and pagan literature in the same tongue.3
We know very little about the state of Latin learning among the English
before the synod of Whitby. 4 After that synod (one of the great turning1
The most convenient bibliography of Anglo-Latin writings for students of English literature is the
section called Writings in Latin of the CBEL (I. 98110). But the Anglo-Latin part of this section (it
includes Celto-Latin writings as well) is incomplete and badly organized. By inadvertence F.J.E.Rabys
History of Secular Latin Poetry in the Middle Ages (Oxford, 1934) is not listed in this section, though
it is duly listed later (I. 281). It will here be cited as Raby 1934, and the same authors History of
Christian-Latin Poetry(Oxford, 1927) will be cited as Raby 1927.
2
Jerome died in A.D. 420; Augustine, in A.D. 430.
3
Some indication of the particular works current in early England may be had from the study of
J.D.A.Ogilvy, Books Known to Anglo-Latin Writers from Aldhelm to Alcuin (Cambridge, Mass., 1936).
We have no like study of vernacular writers, though learned sources for many Old English writings
have been suggested, as will appear below, passim.
4
See above, p. 4. From the witness of Bede (Hist. Eccl.,III. 3, 27) and from investigations into the
sources of Anglo-Latin and vernacular writings, it looks as if the instruction which the Irish gave to
their English pupils went beyond the elementary stage. We have no reason to credit the Roman mission,
however, with anything more than elementary instruction in reading, writing, and singing.
12
ANGLO-LATIN WRITINGS
13
points in English history) the reigning pope sent Theodore of Tarsus to England
to serve as Archbishop of Canterbury and to make as fruitful as possible the
victory of the Romanizers at Whitby. With Theodore went his fellow-monk,
Abbot Hadrian, as chief helper in the work. Both were men of learning, at home
in Latin and Greek. They set up at Canterbury a monastic school which worked
wonders. Within a generation England became the chief seat of scholarship in
western Europe, and that golden age of the English Church began through which
the English people made the greatest of all their contributions to civilization.
During this momentous period England led the world and set the course of history
as she was not to do again until modern times.5
The great service which the scholarship of the golden age rendered to us and
to all men was the preservation and transmission of classical culture. This culture,
long in decline, seemed doomed in its ancient western seats, where barbarization
proceeded apace. Luckily it found, first in Ireland and then in England, a haven
of refuge. Here Christianity soon won the hearts of the heathen, and with the
new faith came Mediterranean civilization, of which the Church had made herself
the bearer. In particular, monasticism flourished, and the monks learned to read
and copy the books that kept the past alive. Further than this most of the monks
did not go, but some took the next step and composed works of their own in the
Latin tongue. The first Englishman of note to do this was Aldhelm; with him we
begin our brief survey of Anglo-Latin writings.
Aldhelm or Ealdhelm (d. 709)6 was a man of Wessex, a kinsman of the
West Saxon king. He began his studies under the Irish scholar Maeldub, but
got most of his training at Canterbury under Theodore and Hadrian. He
gained a remarkable command of Latin, and learned some Greek besides,
and even a little Hebrew. His duties as monk, as abbot of Malmesbury, and
finally as bishop of Sherborne did not keep him from doing a substantial
amount of writing. He is said to have composed in English as well as Latin,
but his vernacular compositions have not come down to us; presumably they
were thought of as trifles, unworthy of written record. For the same reason
only scraps have survived of Aldhelms rhythmical Latin verse; i.e., verse
done in isosyllabic lines.7 Nearly all we have of his poetry is in hexameters,
and belongs to the classical quantitative tradition.
5
See S.J.Crawford, Anglo-Saxon Influence on Western Civilization 600800 (Oxford, 1933). See
also W.Wattenbach, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen im Mittelalter (3ed., Berlin, 1873), I 102; L.von
Ranke, Smmtliche Werke 3ed., XXXVII (Leipzig, 1907). 1113; K.Malone, JHI, I (1940). 292293;
J.W.H.Atkins, English Literary Criticism, the Medieval Phase (Cambridge, 1943), p. 38. The student
would do well to read, besides, the chapter on the golden age in R.H.Hodgkins History of the AngloSaxons (Oxford, 1935). The latest study of these matters is that of W.Levinson, England and the
Continent in the Eighth Century (Oxford, 1946).
6
R.Ehwald, Aldhelmi Opera (Berolini, 1919; Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Antiq., XV).
7
See Ehwald, ed. cit., pp. 520521, where the items are brought together. Ehwald also includes in
his edition (pp. 523537) five Carmina Rhythmica by pupils of Aldhelm: four by thilwald, one by a
pupil whose name is not known. For a discussion of these poems see Raby 1927, pp. 144145 and
Raby 1934, I. 172174. Rhythmical verse must be kept apart from accentual verse, of which it was a
forerunner. A truly accentual Latin versification developed too late in the Middle Ages to come within
the scope of this chapter.
First
Period
Aldhelm
14
Benedict
Biscop
Aldhelms major poem is De Virginitate (2904 lines), a versification of a

prose treatise of his which bears the same name. He also wrote a number of
short Carmina Ecclesiastica (428 lines in all), and 100 versified riddles, done
on the model of the 100 Enigmata of Symphosius,8 but departing from these
in various ways.9 Aldhelm incorporated his riddles into the learned prose
treatise which he wrote on versification, a treatise which took the form of a
letter to King Ealdfrith of Northumbria, whence its title Epistola ad Acircium.10
In it Aldhelm set forth in some detail the principles of metrics as he understood
them, with many examples drawn indiscriminately from classical and
postclassical writings, sacred and profane. A few other letters of Aldhelms
also survive.
Aldhelm wrote Latin well, by the standards of his own time. His taste for
rare words, involved expression, and stylistic display reflects that of the age,
and should not be held against him personally.11 He had great gifts, but his
education proved too much for them. Overawed by the postclassical literary
culture which his teachers hammered into him, he took it as he found it and
made it his own, without thought of criticism. What else could be expected
of a man who was but one remove from barbarism? His writings won the
admiration of many (e.g., Bede), and later writers were more or less influenced
by him, especially in the composition of Latin and vernacular riddles.12 The
cultural developments in northern England, however, proved more important
for Anglo-Latin letters; to these developments let us now proceed.
Benedict Biscop (628690), a Northumbrian monk of noble birth, happened
to be in Rome, on the second of his five journeys to the Continent, when the
Pope made Theodore Archbishop of Canterbury. At the Popes request, Biscop
accompanied Theodore to England, and helped him start his work there,
serving two years as abbot of the monastery at Canterbury. After his return
to his native Northumbria, Biscop founded at Wearmouth a Benedictine
monastery on the Roman model; a few years later he established a sister
8
For the text of Symphosius see R.T.Ohl, The Enigmas of Symphosius (Philadelphia, 1928). The
editor prints the Latin text and an English translation on opposite pages. In his Introduction (pp. 20
23) he sketches briefly the influence of Symphosius on Anglo-Latin writers.
9
Thus, the riddles of Symphosius are all the same length (three lines), whereas those of Aldhelm
vary greatly in length. Aldhelms riddles were edited by J.H.Pitman, Yale Studies in English, LXVII
(1925). The editor gives an English translation in blank verse, and in his introduction discusses Aldhelms
style and influence.
10
Ehwald, ed. cit., pp. 33204. For an explanation of the curious name Acircius, see Ehwald, p.
61.
11
That this taste was no peculiarity of Celto-Latin writers seems dear. Certainly Aldhelms training
at Canterbury did not teach him the error of his ways. Cf. J.W.H.Atkins, op. cit., pp. 4142.
12
This influence went with that of Symphosius; see the discussions of Ohl and Pitman mentioned
above. Besides the riddles of Aldhelm, we have 40 Latin riddles by Ttwine (d. 734), to which his
contemporary Hwtberht or Eusebius added 60 in order to bring the total to the conventional century.
Wynfrith or Boniface (d. 755) and Alcuin (d. 804) also wrote riddles; the former must be reckoned a
disciple of Aldhelm. On the riddles associated with Bede, see F.Tupper, Riddles of the Bede Tradition,
MP, II (1905). 561572. For a study of wider scope see E.Von Erhardt-Siebold, Die lateinischen Rtsel
der Angelsachsen (Heidelberg, 1925); the author notes that the Latin riddles givea picture of an
amazingly developed culture in Old England. Theybear witness, further, to the amazing amount of
reading done by their clerical authors (pp. 34).
15
monastery at Jarrow. These foundations soon became centers of learning

unequaled in western Europe. For them, in repeated journeys to Rome, Biscop
brought together a library adequate to the needs of scholarship. In his own
teaching he applied the lessons he had learned at Canterbury and elsewhere,
and his successor, Abbot Ceolfrid, kept up the good work. Under these two
masters Bede, the teacher of all the Middle Ages,13 and many other
Englishmen got a training comparable to that given by Theodore and Hadrian
at Canterbury. The English golden age reached its height in the double
monastery of Wearmouth-Jarrow.
The Venerable Bede (673735), the greatest of Biscops pupils and the
chief Anglo-Latin writer of the golden age, entered the monastic school at
Jarrow when he was seven years old, and spent the rest of his life in this
monastery, becoming a deacon at 19, a priest at 30; he. performed the regular
duties of a Benedictine monk up to his last illness. His writings are too many
to be listed here;14 they include grammatical and critical handbooks like De
Metrica Arte, scientific treatises like De Ratione Temporum, commentaries
on various books of the Bible (canonical and apocryphal), homilies, saints
lives, and verse. Many of his books had a wide circulation in medieval Europe
and held their own for centuries as the authoritative treatments of their
respective subjects. At present, however, Bedes fame rests chiefly on a work
of his latter years, the Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum (Church
History of the English People).15 This work is our primary source of
information about the most momentous period in English history: the period
of change from barbarism to civilization. In other words, Bede is not only
first among English historians in point of time; he is also first in importance.
The story of the great change found in Bede a worthy teller. The merits
of Bede as a historian have often been pointed out and need not be dwelt
upon here. In assessing his merits as a writer we must bear in mind that he
was first of all the scholar, not the literary artist. He undertook the labor of
composition to set forth historical truth, not to provide aesthetic delight.
But it remains a pleasure to read the History. Bede wrote Latin with the
13
W.Wattenbach, loc. cit.

Bede lists nearly all of them himself at the end of the Hist. Eccl. Editions: J.A.Giles, Worlds of
Venerable Bede (12v, 18431845); J.P.Migne, Ven. Bedae Opera Omnia (Paris, 18501851), in
Patrologiae Cursus Completus (Sec. Ser.), XC-XCV (but Vol. XCV is only partly devoted to Bede);
Expositio Actuum Apostolorum et Retractatio, ed. M.L.W.Laistner (Cambridge, Mass., 1940). See
also M.L.W.Laistner, A Hand-List of Bede Manuscripts (Ithaca, N.Y., 1943), reviewed by N.Ker, MA,
XIII (1944). 3640; and C.W.Jones, Bedae Pseudepigrapha (Ithaca, N.Y., 1939). See also R.W.Chambers,
Bede, in Proc. Brit. Acad., XXII (1936). 129156. For a discussion of Bedes grammatical and
critical writings, see J.W.H.Atkins, op. cit., pp. 4351. For a discussion of his Latin poetry, see Raby
1927, pp. 146149 and Raby 1934, I. 174175. The only vernacular poem of Bedes that has come
down to us, the Death Song, is taken up below, p. 44.
15
Ed. C.Plummer, Bedae Opera Historica (Oxford, 1896), and J.E.King, Baedae Opera Historica
(Loeb Classical Library, 1930). Both these editions also give the Vita Beatorum Abbatum (the lives of the
abbots of the double monastery at Wearmouth-Jarrow), the letter to Archbishop Egbert, and Cuthberts
letter on the death of Bede. The Loeb edition gives Latin text and English translation on opposite pages.
Another translation: Everymans Library No. 479, with an admirable introductory essay by Vida
D.Scudder. Concordance: P.F.Jones, A Concordance to the Hist. Eccl. of Bede (Cambridge, Mass., 1929).
14
Bede
16
competence to be expected of a gifted man whose life had been spent in

speaking, reading, writing, and teaching that tongue. His Latin style was no
miracle, pace Hodgkin.16 It lacks the showiness of Aldhelms style because
Bede, unlike Aldhelm, did not care for show. The style, in its strength and
simplicity, reflects the man.
Bede included in his History, alongside the events commonly reckoned
historical, many miracles, visions, and other matters which strike the modern
reader as unhistorical enough. Here we must allow for the credulity of the
age and, in particular, for the influence of Pope Gregorys Dialogues. Yet
even here Bede makes every effort to be accurate. He admits wonders only
after he has investigated them and found them well authenticated. His
standards of verification are not ours, of course. If today a victim of snakebite
were to drink down some scrapings of Irish books and get well, we should
not conclude that the scrapings had worked the cure. But Bede in accepting
this conclusion not only echoed the medical science of his day; he also paid
tribute to the sanctity and miracle-working power of the sister island. Certainly
no Irishman could outdo Bede in reverence for Ireland. He realized to the
full, Romanizer though he was, how much the English owed to their Irish
teachers, and he showed himself deeply grateful and appreciative.
Most of the unhistorical matter in Bedes History belongs to legend in the
technical sense; that is, to hagiography. Besides the incipient or abbreviated
saints lives scattered through the work, Bede wrote saints lives as such,
notably two lives of St. Cuthbert, the shorter in hexameters, the longer in
prose.17 Bedes contemporaries Felix and Eddi also wrote saints lives,18 and
thenceforth this kind of biography flourished in England as elsewhere in
Christendom.19 Secular biography is exemplified in Bishop Assers Life of
King Alfred,20 but many centuries were to pass before this genre really began
to flourish.21
One of Bedes pupils, Egbert, became Archbishop of York and there set up
a cathedral school which in time eclipsed Wearmouth-Jarrow as a center
16
Op. cit. I. 354.

Here Bede was presumably imitating the fifth-century poet Sedulius, who balanced his Carmen
Paschale with a prose Opus Paschale. Compare Aldhelms two versions of De Virginitate, likewise
inspired by the example of Sedulius.
18
For Felix, see below, p. 75. Edition of Eddi: B.Colgrave, The Life of Bishop Wilfrid, by Eddius
Stephanus: text, translation, and notes (Cambridge, 1927). As early as 713 some monk of Whitby
(name unknown) had written a life of Gregory the Great; it was edited in 1904 by (Cardinal) F.A.Gasquet.
19
Other hagiographies of the golden age: thelwulf, Carmen de Abbatibus Cellae Suae, in T.Arnolds
edition (Rolls Ser., 75) of Simeon of Durhams Hist. Eccl. Dunhelmensis (1882), Appendix I. 265294;
Alcuin, De Pontificibus et Sanctis Ecclesiae Eboracensis Carmen, in Wattenbach and Duemmler,
Monumenta Alcuiniana (Berlin, 1873), PP. 80131, and in J. Raine, The Historians of the Church of
York and its Archbishops (Rolls Ser., 71), I. 349398; Alcuin, Vita Sancti Willibrordi (prose and verse),
in Wattenbach and Duemmler, ed. cit, pp. 3579, and in Migne, Patr. Lat., CI. 694724; Willibald,
Vita Bonifatii, in Mon. Germ. Hist., Scriptorum, II. 331353 (translation by G.W.Robinson, Cambridge,
Mass., 1916); the anonymous Vita Alchuini Abbatis in Wattenbach and Duemmler, ed. cit., pp. 134.
20
Ed. W.H.Stevenson, Assers Life of King Alfred (Oxford, 1904). Translations: by A. S.Cook
(Boston, 1906); by L.C.Jane (1924).
21
The first autobiography by an Englishman is the Vita Willibaldiin T.Tobler, Descriptions
Terrae Sanctae(Leipzig, 1874), pp. 155. Willibald died in A.D. 786.
17
17
of learning. Of the Englishmen trained at York the greatest was Alcuin (735
804).22 The writings of Alcuin have no great literary worth, it is true, but the man
himself remains one of the most important figures in the cultural history of the
West. He owes his importance to the part he played in the revival of learning
which took place under Charles the Great: the so-called Carolingian Renaissance.
Thanks to this revival, the culture of classical antiquity did not die out in western
Europe but was transmitted to later generations and became the foundation
upon which modern civilization was built. But Charles could not set the revival
going out of the resources of his own empire, where only remnants of classical
culture survived. He had to turn to Italy, to Ireland, and above all to England for
teachers and cultural leadership generally. And for captain of his little troop of
scholars he chose Alcuin, who reformed and built up the court school of Charles
on the model of the cathedral school at York, and had a hand in founding other
centers of learning, notably the one at Tours, where he served as abbot. The
success of the Carolingian Renaissance was largely due to Alcuins able leadership.
But no revival of learning would have been possible, even so, had not the great
reform of the Gallican and German churches, earlier in the eighth century, prepared
the way. This reform was the work of Boniface, another Englishman. To Alcuin
and Boniface, then, we of the West owe so much that they will always remain
major figures in the history of our culture.23
While English missionaries and scholars were busy bringing civilization
back to the Continent, Viking raids were laying low the cultural centers of
England. During the ninth century the destruction went so far that, in King
Alfreds words.24 whereas
men from abroad used to seek wisdom and learning here in this country,now,
if we were to have such wisdom and learning, we could get them only from
outside. So utterly had book-learning fallen away in England that there were
very few, this side the Humber, who knew how to interpret their [Latin] servicebooks in English, or even how to translate from Latin into English a written
message; and I think there were not many beyond the Humber.
The good King made great efforts to revive the learning of the golden age,
but not until the latter part of the tenth century did Latin scholarship again
begin to flourish in England. At that time, under the leadership of the three
bishops Dunstan, thelwold, and Oswald, backed by King Edgar,
22
Ed. J.P.Migne, Alcuini Opera Omnia (Paris, 1863), in Patrologia Cursus Completus (Ser. Lat.
Prior), Vols, c and CI; [W.) Wattenbach and [E.] Duemmler, Monumenta Alcuiniana (Berlin, 1873),
sixth volume of P.Iaffes Bibl. Rerum Germ. See also Mon. Germ. Hist., for poems and letters: poems
in Poetae Latini Aevi Carolini, I and IV; letters in Epistolarum, IV. See A.F.West, Alcuin and the Rise
of the Christian Schools (1892); C.J.B.Gaskoin, Alcuin: His Life and his Work (1904); R.B.Page, The
Letters of Alcuin (1909). W.S. Howell, The Rhetoric of Alcuin and Charlemagne: introduction, text,
translation, and notes (Princeton, 1941). On the verse see Raby 1927, pp. 159162 and Raby 1934, I.
178187, and for criticism J.W.H.Atkins, op. cit., pp. 5158.
23
For a brief discussion see Raby 1927, pp. 154158; see also Atkins, op. cit., p. 61. For fuller
treatment see S.J.Crawford, op. cit., and W.Levinson, op. cit.
24
From the Preface of his translation of Gregorys Cura Pastoralis.
Alcuin
Second
Period
18
a monastic reform took place which brought about, among other things, a marked
renewal of scholarly activity.25 The learning of late Old English times, however,
was chiefly concentrated in the south and west: at Glastonbury, Winchester,
Canterbury, Worcester, and other centers. Monasticism in the north had been so
thoroughly uprooted by the Danes that in spite of the efforts of Archbishop
Oswald of York it did not come back into its own until the twelfth century.
In this second period of learned activity the Anglo-Latin writings seem to
have been chiefly in prose. Frithegoda of Canterbury and Wulfstan of
Winchester wrote verse, it is true,26 but, apart from their compositions, little
except prose has come down to us. The prose writings of the period follow
the pattern laid down in the golden age, though not without variation.
Hagiography continues to flourish.27 Historical writing proper is represented
by the Chronica of the ealdorman Ethelwerd 28 and the Historia Novorum in
Anglia of Eadmer.29 We also find translations from English into Latin,
foreshadowings of the decline in vernacular letters which lay ahead.30 The
most active field, however, came to be that of monastic education and
discipline. Here thelwold led the way with his De Consuetudine
Monachorum, but his pupil lfric, best known for vernacular writings,
composed the fundamental schoolbooks needed for teaching Latin to the
oblates. These books, the Grammar, the Glossary, and the Colloquy,31 gave
to the masters in the monastic schoolrooms admirable tools. The Colloquy in
particular is so good that even today we have nothing better to offer to wouldbe learners of a foreign tongue. Nothing of comparable merit can be found
among the schoolbooks current at this time on the Continent.
25
Consult D.Knowles, The Monastic Order in England: A History of its Development 9431216
(Cambridge, 1940); J.A.Robinson, The Times of St. Dunstan (Oxford, 1923). See also F.Tupper, MLN,
VIII (1893). 344367.
26
See Raby 1927, pp. 152153. Bibliography in CBEL, I. 107.
27
Hagiographies of the second period: B.s life of Dunstan, in W.Stubbs, Memorials of St. Dunstan;
Rolls Ser., 63 (1874), pp. 352 (but Stubbs thinks that B. was a Continental Saxon, not an Englishman);
Osberns life of Dunstan, in Stubbs, ed. cit., pp. 69161; Eadmers life of Dunstan, in Stubbs, ed. cit.,
pp. 162249; lfrics life of thelwold, in J.Stevensons edition (Rolls Ser., 2) of the Chronicon
Monasterii de Abingdon, II (1858). 253266; Wulfstan of Winchesters life of thelwold (prose with
appended verses), in Migne, Patr. Lat., CXXXVII 79114; Frithegoda of Canterburys life of Wilfrid
(verse), in Raine, ed. cit., I. 105159; Eadmers life of Wilfrid, in Raine, ed. cit., I. 161226; the
anonymous life of Oswald, in Raine, ed. cit., I. 399475; Eadmers life of Oswald, in Raine, ed. cit., II.
159; Eadmers life of Anselm, in M.Rules edition (Rolls Ser., 81) of Eadmers Historia Novorum
(1884), pp. 303440; the anonymous life of Edward the Confessor, ed. H.R.Luard (1858; Rolls Ser.,
3), PP. 387435.
28
Monumenta Historica Britannica (1848), pp. 499521. As Ethelwerd was a layman, one would
not expect him to write good Latin; the thing to wonder at is his ability to write Latin at all. So far as
we know, western Europe possessed no other Latin-writing layman of royal blood c. 1000.
29
Ed. M.Rule, ed. cit., pp. 1302. Eadmers work is well done, but does not live up to its title; it
amounts to a life of Anselm, told by a devoted follower of his.
30
Thus, we have a translation into Latin of the Old English Annals. Colmans life of Bishop Wulfstan
of Worcester was written in English but survives only in a Latin translation (by William of Malmesbury).
See R.W.Chambers, EETS, 186 (1932), pp. lxxxiii-iv.
31
Ed. J.Zupitza, lfrics Grammatik und Glossar (Berlin, 1880); W.H.Stevenson, Early Scholastic
Colloquies (Oxford, 1929), pp. 74102 (Stevensons book includes other Anglo-Latin colloquies as
well); G.N.Garmonsway, lfrics Colloquy (1931).
19
lfrics other Latin works, though written with characteristic competence,

have less cultural importance.32
If the golden age is marked by a fusion of cultures, the period with which
we are now dealing shows an ever growing predominance of the
Mediterranean over the native component in the fusion-product. By the
eleventh century English monastic life had come to differ little from that of
western Europe in general. The medieval world was fast becoming a cultural
unit, dominated by a Church international in outlook and centralized in
administration. To this trend of things the Church of England, by her devotion
to the Papacy and her missionary efforts in behalf of papal supremacy, had
made the decisive contribution, through Wilfrid, Boniface, and a host of other
workers in the field. In the cataclysm which was about to sweep the English
nation into foreign bondage, one element of the national life stood firm:
Anglo-Latin letters. The literature of learning held its own, and even made
forward strides, because its linguistic medium and scholarly pattern were
already international.
32
Bibliography in CBEL, I. 9192.
III
The Old Tradition:1 Poetic Form

Speaking
and
Writings
Runes
Few things of mans begetting outlast for long the times that give them birth,
and works of literary art share the fate of the rest. The loss is the heavier
when (as in Old English) much of the artistic activity takes the shape of
speakings; that is, literary compositions designed for oral rendition (sung or
said) and as a rule not circulated in written form.2 No speakings, of course,
could come down to us unless they happened to get recorded, and even then
the chances would be all against their survival, for most of the old manuscripts
perished long ago, victims of the years.3 One might therefore reasonably expect
to find the Old English literary records (or what is left of them) made up
chiefly of writings; that is, compositions designed for circulation in written
form. And when the records are studied, this expectation is more than fulfilled;
indeed, the student may seek long before he finds any speakings at all. The
few that survive are our oldest literary heirlooms, for the literary art of the
English (as of the other Germanic peoples) before their conversion to
Christianity found expression in speakings only.
The English of heathen times knew how to write, it is true. They brought
with them from the Continent a futhark or runic alphabet of twenty-four
letters, and to this in the course of time they added several new signs of their
own. But the runes were epigraphic characters, and their use was therefore
limited to inscriptions, cut or hammered out on hard surfaces (e.g., the pommel
of a sword, the sides of a monumental stone, the top or sides of a box). This
kind of writing is obviously not well suited to the recording of literary
compositions, which (unless very short) need more space than a
runemaster would be likely to find available. Moreover, even if a suitable
1
The chief work on the Germanic literary tradition is A.Heuslers Die Altgermanische Dichtung
(Berlin, n.d. but copyright 1926). For the Germanic background in general, J.Hoopss Reallexikon der
germanischen Altertumskunde (4V, Strassburg, 19111919) is useful.
2
Speakings are also known as oral literature, a subject treated at length by H.M. and
N.K.Chadwick, The Growth of Literature. The actual and hypothetical speakings of Old English are
discussed in Vol. I of this work (Cambridge, 1932). The authors, however, take for speakings many
compositions which others interpret as writings.
3
Only eight Old English MSS with much vernacular poetry in them have survived. These are the
Corpus MS, more precisely MS CCCC 201, at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge (whence the abbreviation
CCCC); the so-called Paris Psalter, or MS Fonds Latin 8824 of the Bibliothque National in Paris; the
Vercelli Book, or Codex CXVII of the cathedral chapter library at Vercelli in northern Italy; the Exeter
Book, preserved in the library of Exeter Cathedral; MS Junius II (often called the Cdmon MS) at the
Bodleian Library, Oxford; and three MSS in the Cotton collection at the British Museum: Vitellius A XV
(2nd MS, the Nowell or Beowulf codex), Otho A VI (the Boethius MS), and Tiberius B I. Nearly all these
MSS, moreover, have come down in a more or less damaged or mutilated state.
20
THE OLD TRADITION: POETIC FORM
21
hard surface could be found, it would hardly be used to put a poem on unless
there were some very special reason for making such a record. Be it added
that runemasters were few and far between, and presumably drew good pay
for cutting an inscription; in other words, epigraphic writing was expensive.
The poets, for their part, would naturally be interested in making their
compositions known to the public (i.e., in uttering them, or having them
uttered, before audiences), not in making records of them which few would
see and fewer could read. Certainly no English poems of heathen times have
come down to us in the form of runic inscriptions, and we have no reason to
think that such poems were ever so recorded in English (though Scandinavian
cases of the kind are known).
With the introduction of Christianity a great change took place. The
missionaries brought parchment, pen and ink, and the custom of writing literary
compositions down. They also brought the Roman alphabet.4 The English
futhark, epigraphic though it was in origin and history, might perfectly well
have been used for writing with pen and ink on parchment, but the foreign
missionaries and their English pupils associated the Roman alphabet with this
kind of writing and used it, not only in copying Latin texts, but also in making
English texts. Yet the old runes were not given up for centuries. They were kept
alongside the new letters, and the co-existence of two kinds of writing naturally
led to overlapping. On the one hand, letters might be used in inscriptions; on
the other, runes might be used in manuscripts. The two runes thorn and wynn,
indeed, were added to the alphabet, as symbols for sounds wanting in
postclassical Latin but common in English. And the new practice of recording
literary compositions had its effect on native epigraphy: thus, the Dream of the
Rood won epigraphic as well as manuscript record.5
In Old English times the Church monopolized the production of manuscripts.
A layman might know how to read; he might even be an author (like King
Alfred). But it would hardly occur to him to undertake the work of a scribe, any
more than it would occur to the ordinary reader or author of today to undertake
the work of a printer. The making of manuscripts was in the hands of the Church
because the art or craft of writing on parchment with pen and ink was part of the
professional equipment of the well-trained cleric, and of him alone. And the
monopoly was strengthened by the workings of supply and demand. The Church
made manuscripts chiefly though not wholly for her own use; the readers of the
day were mostly clerics. Old English literature as we have it (not as it was)
therefore reflects the tastes and professional .interests of the clergy; from the
MSS we get a one-sided picture of the literary art of those days. Poems that the
4
Most of the Old English MSS were written in the so-called insular hand, a minuscule script
developed by the Irish out of half-uncial and brought to England by Irish missionaries in the seventh
century. Toward the end of the Old English period the insular hand lost favor, and the so-called Caroline
minuscule script, already dominant on the Continent, became fashionable in England as well.
5
Runes were used for some alliterative verses inscribed on the Franks Casket (eighth century?).
Text in Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 116.
The
Roman
Alphabet
MSS
22
Authors
clerics for any reason disliked or disapproved of did not get recorded, unless
they happened to strike the fancy of some nonconformist scribe or anthologist
who had the courage of his heterodoxy. Moreover, since little space was
available, items thought of as trivial or as less important stood little chance
of inclusion in a MS miscellany. Few things in lighter vein could be expected
to come down to us under such-conditions, and in fact the tone of the extant
literary monuments is prevailingly serious and edifying.
Departures from the normal pattern we owe, no doubt, to the likes and
dislikes of individual makers or takers of MSS. In many cases pride of
authorship may have played a part; certainly a clerical author had ways of
getting his compositions written down, even if he did not write them down
himself, and the bulk of what we have was presumably composed as well as
written down by clerics. A few compositions seem wholly secular, and two of
them (Wifes Lament and Eadwacer) purport to be by women. But even here
we cannot be certain of lay authorship; in every period of English literature
clergymen have composed works secular enough in tone and spirit, and a
male author might perfectly well make a woman his mouthpiece. The case is
otherwise when the composition is definitely heathen (rather than secular);
here clerical authorship must be ruled out. Unluckily no compositions of this
kind, on the literary level, have come down to us, except a few spells (or
charms), and most of these, in their recorded form, show more or less of a
Christian coloring. On the other hand, we cannot safely presume clerical
authorship of every work religious in tone or subject. Cdmon was a farmhand
(Hild made him a monk after God had made him a poet), and other religious
pieces besides his may well have been composed by men who had never taken
holy orders or monastic vows. Our uncertainties are the greater since in most
cases we do not know so much as the name of the author of a given work,
and even if we happen to know the authors name we may be little the wiser;
thus, our knowledge of the poet Cynewulf is limited to what we can glean
from his poems. This want of biographical information, however, need not
disturb us overmuch. Literary art in Old English times was highly traditional,
and the personal history of the author did not come out in his compositions
so markedly as it does in times when originality rather than mastery of a
conventional mode wins the prizes.
Old English writings might be in prose or verse; speakings were restricted
to verse, in early times at least.6 We set the prose aside for the time being. The
verse, writings and speakings alike, was regularly composed in the alliterative
measure that had come down to the English from their Germanic forefathers.
6
It seems unlikely that the English of heathen times cultivated the prose speaking or anecdote as a
literary art-form; certainly we have no evidence of the existence of such an art-form then, though it
may have developed in later times. See C.E.Wright, The Cultivation of Saga in Anglo-Saxon England
(Cambridge, 1939), and K.Malone, English Studies, XXIII (1921). 110112.
23
Before taking up the poetic kinds (or genres) cultivated in this measure, it
will be needful to consider the measure itself, and the style that went with it.
Old Germanic verse makes many problems for the prosodist, and none of
the methods of scansion proposed need be taken as definitive.7 Here we shall
deal briefly with the main points. The rhythm of the verse grew naturally out
of the prose rhythm (as we saw above), by a process of metrical heightening
and lowering. A metrically heightened syllable is called a lift (German hebung);
a metrically lowered syllable, a drop (German senkung). Only a syllable that
took or might take a main stress in the prose rhythm was subject to metrical
heightening; in the same way, only a syllable that lacked or might lack stress in
the prose rhythm was subject to metrical lowering. We do not know just how
the metrical heightening and lowering were brought about, but time as well as
stress played a part, and such verse as was sung or chanted necessarily made
use of pitch patterns different from those of ordinary speech. The metrical
heightening might be reinforced by alliteration8 or rime, giving a major lift. A
lift not so reinforced is a minor lift. The basic metrical unit was the short verse,
made up of a varying number of syllables, at least one of which was a lift.
Usually the short verse had two lifts. Such a verse might stand alone or in
series. We illustrate with a passage from a legal text, Hit Becw:9
ne plot ne ploh,
ne turf ne toft,
ne furh ne fotml,
ne land ne lse,
ne fersc ne mersc,
ne ruh ne rum,
nor plot nor plowland,

nor sod nor site,
nor furrow nor foot-length,
nor tillage nor pasturage,
nor fresh [water] nor marsh,
nor rough [land] nor open [land],
wudes ne feldes,
landes ne strandes,
wealtes ne wteres.
of wood nor of field,

of land nor of strand,
of wold nor of water.
Here we have nine short verses in series. The first six verses make a group, and
the last three verses make another group; grouping by twos (giving long verses
or lines) does not occur in this passage. The verses are not linked one to another
by alliteration; each verse is a closed system so far as alliteration goes. Six
verses have alliteration, two have rime, and one dispenses with both these aids.
Passages like that from Hit Becw were exceptional in Old English.
7
A recent study: J.C.Pope, The Rhythm of Beowulf (1942). Earlier studies: E.Sievers, Altgermanische
Metrik (1893); A.Heusler, Deutsche Versgeschichte I (1925). See also K. Malone, ELH, VIII (1941). 7480.
8
Two syllables are said to alliterate if each begins with the same sound. But in Old English verse
only lifts were included in an alliterative pattern. Morover, the consonant combination sk (sc) for
alliterative purposes was reckoned a single sound, and alliterated with itself only; similarly with the
combinations st and sp. On the other hand, all vowels and dipthongs, for alliterative purposes, were
reckoned the same sound.
9
F.Liebermann, Die Gesetze der Angehachsen, I (1903). 400. The text was also printed by F.Grendon,
Jour, of Amer. folk-Lore, XXII (1909). 179180. The title Hit Becw [he] bequeathed it comes
from the first two words of the text; compare Habeas Corpus and the like.
Short
Verse
and Line
24
Ordinarily the short verses were grouped by twos, and a given verse occurred
as the on-verse (first half) or the off-verse (second half) of a line. Here
alliteration could not be dispensed with, for the line was an alliterative unit.
A short verse included in a line is commonly called a half-line. A good example
of an Old English line of poetry is Beowulf, 1725,
hu mihtig God manna cynne
how mighty God to mankind.
Lifts
Here hu mihtig God is the on-verse, manna cynne the off-verse. The two halves
of the line are bound together by alliteration: the stave (i.e., the alliterating
sound) is m. The line has four lifts, two in each half; two of the lifts are major,
two are minor. The second and third lifts have no drop between them, but they
have a pause between them which separates them more sharply than a drop
could do. A more unusual (though not rare) type is Beowulf, 2987,
heard swyrd hilted, ond his helm somod
hard sword hilted, and his helm besides.
Here the two halves are doubly bound by alliteration: heard, hilted and helm are
linked by the h-stave, swyrd and somod by the s-stave. There are five lifts: three
in the on-verse, two in the off-verse. The first three lifts are juxtaposed, and so
are the last two. All the lifts are major. Yet a third type is Beowulf, 2995,
landes ond locenra beaga;
of land and linked rings;
Sievers,
Heusler,
Pope
ne orfte him a lean owitan

he needed not to blame him for those rewards.
Here we have six lifts, three in each half-line. Three lifts are major, three
minor. Each lift is accompanied by one or more drops. Many other varieties
occur, but the fundamental features of the line remain the same.
It is easier to determine the lift-pattern of a line than to divide its half-lines
into feet (or measures). Here it is customary to distinguish between the half-lines
of normal length (as in Beowulf, 1725) and so-called swollen or abnormally long
half-lines (as in Beowulf, 2995). According to Sievers, a normal half-line had
two feet; a swollen half-line, three feet. According to Heusler and Pope, however,
each half-line, whether normal or swollen, had two feet. Heusler recognized only
one kind of foot: this began with a main stress and included also a subordinate
stress. Sievers, however, recognized four kinds of feet. To these he gave no names,
but we shall call them classes 1, 2, 3, and 4. In class I (e.g., drhten lord) the
stress came at the beginning; in class 2 (e.g., begng circuit) the stress came at
the end; in class 3 (e.g., fa few) the foot was monosyllabic; in class 4 (e.g.,
wlngen excellent) the foot was polysyllabic, with initial main stress and
medial or final subordinate stress. 10 Both Heusler and Sievers began
10
Here the acute accent marks main stress; the grave, subordinate stress. Sievers did not include in
his system a polysyllabic foot with initial or medial subordinate stress and final main stress: e.g., fl
ar d quite inexorable (Wanderer 5).
25
the half-line, on occasion, with an onset of one or more syllables reckoned as

anacrusis: a kind of running start that belonged indeed to the half-line but
made no part of the podic pattern. For Heusler this pattern was the same in
every foot: two beats to the measure, whatever the number of syllables in the
foot. The first or stronger beat coincided with the main stress of the prose
rhythm. The second or weaker beat coincided with the subordinate stress of
the prose rhythm, if such a stress occurred; otherwise, the weaker beat fell on
an unstressed syllable, or on a pause (metrically a rest) in the prose rhythm,
and served to heighten the syllable or the rest as the case might be. We illustrate
Heuslers system of scansion with the on-verse of Beowulf, 1173:
beo wi Geatas gld
be kind to the Geatas.
Here beo wi made the onset, Geatas the first foot, and gld the second foot.
The stronger beats fell on the alliterating syllables. The weaker beat of the
first foot fell on the ending of Geatas; that of the second foot, on the rest
after gld. For Sievers the half-lines fell into five types. In type A, both feet
were of class I; in type B, both were of class 2; in type C, the first was of class
2, the second was of class I; in type D, the first was of class 3, the second was
of class 4; in type E, the first was of class 4, the second was of class 3.
Examples of these types follow, all taken from on-verses of Beowulf. The
onset is set off by double diagonals; the feet are divided by single diagonals.
A 1987 hu // lmp eow on / lde
B 1939 t hit sca / denm l
C 1192 him was fl / bren
D 2705 for // wrt / Wdra hlm
E 1160 glomnnes / gd
how went it with you on the road?

that it the damascened sword
the cup was borne to him
The Weders lord cut through
the gleemans song.
Popes system of scansion may be described as a modification of Heuslers.

According to Pope, each half-line had two feet, sung or chanted in 4/8 time
(normal verse) or 4/4 time (swollen verse). The first foot of a halfline might
be heavy or light. The second foot was regularly heavy. The light foot of
Pope answers to the onset of Heusler; its lifts (one main and one subordinate)
were both weak, and were excluded from the alliterative pattern of the line.
We illustrate with Beowulf, 264a:
gebd wntra wrn
he lived many years.
Here gebad makes the first foot, wintra worn the second. The first foot is
light; it begins with a rest beat which takes the main stress. The second foot
is heavy; it has two major lifts.
The systems of Sievers, Heusler, and Pope are outlined here for the
information of the reader, but the student will do well enough in reading if he
follows the natural rhythm of the lines, with due heed given to the liftpatterns
and in particular to those syllables which the poets by alliteration and rime
marked for heightening.
26
LineGroups
We have already seen that the short verse, the basic metrical unit, usually occurred
by twosthat is, in lines, the two parts of which were linked by alliteration. Old
English verse in all periods was almost exclusively linear (that is, made up of lines).
In the oldest linear verse the end-stopped style prevailed: every line ended with a
syntactical pause and every sentence made either a line or a couplet (i.e., a two-line
unit). This pre-classical style of composition was kept, almost intact, in the mnemonic
parts or thulas (i.e., metrical name-lists) of Widsith, where one sentence runs to six
lines but all the others make either a single line or a couplet each. The Leiden
Riddle likewise was done (though with less strictness) in the old style, and many
one-line and two-line units occur in the spells. Otherwise, only relics of the preclassical style may be found in the monuments.11 Formulas like Beowulf, 456,
Hrogar maelode, helm Scyldinga
Hrothgar spoke, the helm of the Scyldings,
seem to reflect such a style, and other one- or two-line formulas occur in the
laws and elsewhere. One might have expected to find end-stopping used a
good deal in the gnomic verses, but here the clerical writers have given us the
traditional material in remodeled form.12 A few pieces of gnomic wisdom,
however, have come down to us in lines or couplets. Exeter Gnomics, 158,
licgende beam lsest growe
a fallen tree grows least
may serve to illustrate the one-line gnomic, while Age mec, 117118,
bi t selast onne mon him sylf ne mg
wyrd onwendan t he on wel olige
that is best, when one himself cannot
amend his fate, that he then put up with it
exemplifies the two-line gnomic. Somewhat similar in style is the linear formula
of consolation used six times in Deor. Such formulas, nevertheless, regularly
appear in a setting dominated by the run-on style of linear composition. In
general, a plurilinear unit of classical Old English poetry was held together,
not by uniformities of rhythmical or alliterative pattern, nor yet by uniformities
of grouping (i.e., strophic structure), but by the use of run-on lines.
Yet the classical style grew out of the older, end-stopped style of
composition, and kept what could be kept of the earlier technic. In the matter
of plurilinear units the poverty of the old style was marked: only the twoline
unit or couplet existed. The richness of the classical style in plurilinear units
is no less marked: we find many such units of three, four, five, six, or
11
The Riming Poem relies on rime rather than syntax to mark its three quatrains, 21 couplets and
33 single lines as separate and distinct units, and can hardly be taken as a survival or revival of the old
end-stopped style of composition.
12
See A.Heusler, Zcitschrift des Vereins fr Volkskunde, XXVI (1916). 52.
27
seven lines; indeed, there was no limit to the number of lines permissible in
making such a unit. This great change was brought about with the least
possible disturbance to the old order. We illustrate with Beowulf, 639641:
am wife a word wel licodon,
gilpcwide Geates. Eode goldhroden
freolicu folccwen to hire frean sittan.
To that woman those words were pleasing,
the proud speech of the Geat. She went, gold-adorned,
the noble folk-queen, to sit by her lord.
Here we have a three-line unit, made up of two sentences, each a line and a
half long. Sentences of this length were forbidden to the oldest poets, but it
would have been easy for them to say the same thing in two one-line sentences,
as follows:
am wife a word wel licodon.
Folccwen code to hire frean sittan.
These lines bring out, besides, the starkness of the old style. It may well have
been a wish to make this style less bare which led to the expansion of the sentences
beyond the linear limits; if so, the new plurilinear units were a mere by-product
of a process set going for reasons unconnected with plurilinear structure.
In this connection we distinguish two kinds of run-on line. In the first, the
sentence goes on to the next line without a syntactical pause; in the second, it
goes on with a syntactical pause. The second kind of run-on line has obviously
kept something of the old end-stopped style, and presumably grew out of the
linear sentence. We further distinguish three stages in the development of the
run-on style. The early stage is exemplified in the amnemonic parts of Widsith
(the mnemonic parts, as we have seen, exemplify the end-stopped style). Here
the plurilinear units vary in number of lines, but this variation is held within
comparatively narrow limits: no unit longer than nine lines occurs. All the
natural divisions of the poem end with a line; not one ends with an on-verse
(i.e., in the middle of a line). Single lines and couplets make a respectable
proportion of the whole. Most of the run-on lines are of the second kind
mentioned above; that is, they end with a syntactical pause, though not with
a full stop. Beowulf may serve to illustrate the middle stage of the run-on
style. Here some of the plurilinear units are of great length; their length may
be so great, indeed, that they no longer can be felt as units and include diverse
matters. Single lines and couplets are infrequent. The fits (or cantos, as some
prefer to call them) all end with a line, but some of the natural divisions end
with an on-verse: thus, the Finn and Ingeld episodes, and one of the speeches.13
Six of the speeches begin with an off-verse. Judith exemplifies the late stage
of the run-on style. Here one can hardly speak of plurilinear units at
13
Line 389. But here the text seems to be defective.
Run-On
Style
28
Variation
all, or indeed of clean-cut units of any kind, apart from the fits. If we follow the
punctuation of Wlcker, only 11 of the 350 lines end with a full stop, and three of
these mark the end of a fit. Since the sentences usually begin and end in the middle
of a line, the syntactical and alliterative patterns rarely coincide at any point, and
the matter is presented en masse, so to speak. The verses give the effect of a neverending flow, but this continuous effect is gained at a heavy structural cost.14
So far as one can tell, the technic of adornment or elaboration was
essentially the same in pre-classical and classical poetry. The starkness of the
pre-classical style went naturally with its end-stopped lines, which left little
room for ornamentation, but any room left did not fail to be used. Sheer
adornment, it is true, may have been wanting in the oldest poetry: equivalents
and attributives may have been put in, first of all, for the sake of the additional
information which they gave. But if this was their origin, their original function
soon became secondary. The use of equivalents for poetical purposes is
technically known as variation. We illustrate, first, with a few linear formulas.
In Beowulf, 3076,
Wiglaf maelod Wihstanes sunu,
the on-verse gives us needful information: namely, that the next passage is to
be a speech by Wiglaf. The off-verse may be said to give us further information
about the speaker, but since this same information had been given to us earlier
(in line 2602) the chief function of the off-verse is hardly informative but
rather poetic or (if you will) stylistic. More precisely, since we know already
that Wiglaf is Wihstans son, the off-verse serves primarily to repeat the subject
in variant form, and, technically speaking, Wihstanes sunu is a variation of
Wiglaf. The repetition includes the predicate as well (for maelode is to be
understood after Wihstanes sunu), but not in variant form; not formally,
indeed, at all. We may therefore put the line into modern English as follows:
Wiglaf spoke, the son of Wihstan [spoke].
It will be seen that the variation, though appositive on the face of it, is felt
rather as a repetition that involves the sentence as a whole. The term apposition
therefore does not adequately describe the device, and the use of a special
term variation seems quite in order. In Widsith, 1,
Widsi maolade, wordhord onleac,
the off-verse repeats the predicate (not the subject) in variant form, and we
may put the line into current speech as follows:
Widsith spoke, [he] unlocked the word-hoard.
Here the variation can hardly be said to give us any further information, and
its function is strictly poetic or stylistic.
14
In this history a poem in the run-on style the stage of which is not specified may be presumed to
belong to the middle stage. See, further, K.Malone, RES, XIX (1943). 201204.
29
In both the examples which we have considered, the variation may be

called inner, since it varies something already expressed in the same sentence.
In Beowulf, 360,
Wulfgar maelode to his winedrihtne,
we have a case of outer variation: his winedrihtne his lord varies something
already expressed, indeed, but not in the same sentence; we know only from
the context who Wulfgars lord is. In outer variation no parallelism of
grammatical construction is to be expected as between the variation and the
thing varied. Even in inner variation, indeed, such parallelism need not be
thoroughgoing. In Beowulf, 1458,
t ws an, foran, ealdgestreona,
the adverb foran varies the adjective an, and the line means that was unique,
[that was] to the fore, among old treasures. In Beowulf, 23772378,
hwre he him on folce freondlarum heold,
estum, mid are, o t he yldra wear,
but he backed him up, in the tribe, with friendly teachings, [he backed him
up] with kindnesses, [he backed him up] with help, until he grew older, the
prepositional phrase mid are varies the simple case-forms freondlarum and
estum. Here the variants, though loosely synonymous, are not identical in
meaning (a state of things often found in the technic of variation). But more
nearly synonymous variants may differ in grammatical construction. Thus,
in Andreas, 1074b1076,
him seo wen gelah,
syan mid corre carcernes duru
eorre scberend opene fundon,
that expectation played them false when the company, the angry spearmen,
found the doors of the prison open, the prepositional phrase mid corre
varies the nominative plural scberend (here we have also a case in which
the variation precedes the thing varied). Such variations in mid (or in the
simple dative) presumably arose out of ordinary accompaniment: A with B
was another way of saying A and B. When a variation happened to be almost
or altogether identical in meaning with the thing varied the machinery of
accompaniment might still be used, even though in such cases this machinery
perforce lost its proper meaning and became a mere form of words.
Stereotypes of another kind were the Kennings, a characteristic feature of
Old Germanic poetical diction. These arose as variations, but in many cases
became so familiar that they could be used without previous mention of the
thing varied. A kenning may be described as a two-member (or two-term)
circumlocution for an ordinary noun: such a circumlocution might take the
form of a compound, like hronrad sea (literally ridingplace of the whale),
Kennings
30
Poetical
Diction
or of a phrase, like fugles wynn feather (literally birds joy).15 Alongside

the kenning we find the heiti, a one-term substitute for an ordinary noun:
e.g., ash or wood in the sense spear (the weapon-name being varied in
terms of material, like iron for sword). The heiti differed from the kenning
in that it was simplex, not composital or phrasal, but it resembled the kenning
in that it arose as a variation. In their use of kenning and heiti the English
poets showed a characteristic classical restraint. These stylistic features did
not have in England the luxuriant growth that they had in Iceland (whence
come their names). One may note in passing that the circumlocutions for
verbs, like grundwong ofgyfan die (literally give up the earth), were
markedly fewer in number than those for nouns, and did not give rise to a
technical term parallel to kenning.16
Poetic adornment might also take attributive form. The adjective in such a
phrase as fealu flod fallow flood is not without descriptive value and
presumably came into use, as part of the phrase, because it had descriptive
value, but it early became a standing or conventional poetic epithet by virtue
of frequent use in such phrases. Many standing expressions like fealu flod
may be found in Old English poetry. Thus, a eoden prince is commonly
and conventionally illustrious: he is a mre eoden. The device is not limited
to poetry, of course, but the poets made much use of it and not a few
expressions of the kind belong definitely to poetic diction.
In general it may be noted that the vocabulary and phraseology of poetry
differed greatly from that of prose. Words and phrases may be marked as poetical
by occurrence, dialectal form, or both. Thus, the word mece sword is doubly
marked: it does not occur in prose (apart from glosses) and its dialectal form is
Anglian (i.e., Northumbrian or Mercian).17 Poetic diction, though out of fashion
at the moment, is still with us, and the phenomenon, as such, hardly needs
explanation here. The Anglian dialectal forms are another matter. Nearly all the
Old English poetry extant has come down to us in West Saxon versions. In these
versions, however, Anglian forms often occur, and some words, like mece, never
take the West Saxon form which one would expect in a West Saxon setting. This
feature, characteristic of so many Old English poetical texts, is commonly
explained on the theory that the poems were first composed and recorded in an
Anglian dialect, and that the scribes who made the West Saxon versions sometimes
copied an Anglian dialectal form mechanically instead of substituting the
equivalent West Saxon forms. Fixed forms like mece are explicable on the theory
that the Anglian dialects held a certain prestige in metrical composition, and that
the fixed forms served to give poetic flavor, for a West Saxon audience at least.
As in any traditional period, so in Old English times poetic effects could
15
A modern parallel: Montys moonshine artificial daylight.

Sometimes Kenning is applied to verbal as well as to nominal circumlocutions. The most detailed
study of Old English kennings is that of Hertha Marquardt, Die altenglischen Kenningar (Halle, 1938);
see also K.Malone, MLN, LV (1940). 7374.
17
The corresponding West Saxon dialectal form mce occurs, be it noted, in the prose compound
mcefisc mullet.
16
31
be had, more or less mechanically, by using words and turns of phrase not
customary in prose but familiar to the poets audience as part of the stylistic
tradition of poetry. Such words and turns of phrase need not be labeled archaic;
certainly they were very much alive in the mouths of the poets and in the ears
of their hearers.18 A given poet was reckoned worthy if he handled with skill
the stuff of which, by convention, poems must be made. This stuff was not
merely stylistic, however; matter as well as manner was prescribed. And that
brings us to another part of our subject.19
18
For want of evidence we cannot tell (in most cases) whether a given word or turn of phrase had
earlier been used in prose, though now restricted to poetry.
19
Many stylistic features must here be left out, for want of space. Thus, we include no discussion of
familiar rhetorical devices like litotes or understatement. For further discussion, see especially A.C.Bartlett,
The Larger Rhetorical Patterns in Anglo-Saxon Poetry (1935) and the pioneer paper by J.Kail, Ueber
die parallelstellen in der angel schsischen Poesie, published in Anglia, XII (1889). 2140. The most
important recent article on the subject is that of L.D.Benson, PMLA, LXXXI (1966). 334341. On the
oral-formulaic theory in general, see H.L.Rogers, English Studies, XLVII (1966). 89102.
IV
The Old Tradition: Popular Poetry
Thulas
The oldest Germanic verses extant are two metrical lists of names, recorded
in works of the first and second centuries of our era. Such a metrical list is
technically known as a thula.1 Tacitus in his Germania (A.D. 98) gives us a
two-line thula the names of which appear, of course, in Latinized form.2 This
thula has for us a special interest for another reason: it is our first record of
the English name. The thula reads thus:
Reudingi, Auiones, Anglii, Varini,
Eudoses, Suardones, Unithones.
A like thula, giving our earliest record of the Saxon name, is set down in the
Geography of Claudius Ptolemy (c. A.D. 150):3
Saxones, Sigulones, Sabalingii, Cobandi,
Chali, Phunusii, Charudes.
In both cases the alliteration shows that we have to do with verse, and verse
of this kind is well evidenced, later on, in vernacular sources. Thus, the pedigree
of King Cynric of the West Saxons is given metrical form in the following
thula:4
Cynric [ws] Cerdicing, Cerdic Elesing,
Elesa Esling, Esla Gewising,
Gewis Wiging, Wig Freawining,
Freawine Friugaring, Friugar Bronding,
Brond Bldging, Bldg Wodening.
The Kings descent from Woden could be told in correct verses all the better
for being fictitiousthe names were chosen to fit the alliterative rules. More
elaborate are the three thulas of the sixth century incorporated in Widsith.
The first of these (lines 1833 of the poem) falls into two parts: a five-couplet
unit and a six-line unit. The first couplet may serve to show the structure and
subject-matter of this thula:5
1
The term comes from Iceland, where the genre flourished. The metrical name-lists of Widsith
were first called thulas by Heusler and Ranisch, Eddica Minora (1903), p. lxxxix.
2
Cap. 40. For a full discussion of the passage, see K.Malone, Namn och Bygd, XXII (1934). 2651.
For the Latin text, see p. 317 of the standard edition of the Germania, that of R.P. Robinson (1935).
3
II, II, 7. See K.Malone, Namn och Bygd, XXII (1934). 3031.
4
OE Annals, ed. Earle-Plummer (1892), pp. 16 (A.D. 552), 20 (A.D. 597). See also R.W. Chambers,
Beowulf, An Introduction (2ed., 1932), pp. 316317. The suffix ing, used 10 times here, means son of.
5
Widsith, ed. K.Malone (1936), pp. 6768; see also pp. 1220.
32
THE OLD TRADITION: POPULAR POETRY
33
tla weold Hunum, Eormanric Gotum,

Becca Baningum, Burgendum Gifica
Attila ruled the Huns, Ermanric the Goths,
Becca the Banings, Gifica the Burgundians.
The first thula is a list of kings; each king (30 are listed) is identified in terms
of the tribe he rules. The second thula, as we have it, consists of twenty lines
(5764, 6869, 75, 7987): ten single lines and five couplets. Its first two
lines (a couplet) sufficiently indicate its pattern:
Ic ws mid Hunum ond mid Hregotum,
mid Sweom ond mid Geatum ond mid Sudenum
I was with the Huns and with the Hreth-Goths,
with the Swedes and with the Geats and with the South-Danes.
This thula is a list of tribes (54 are listed), given in terms of the personal
experiences of the speaker. The third thula as it stands is made up of nine
lines (112118, 123124), of which the first reads
Hehcan sohte ic ond Beadecan ond Herelingas
I sought out Hehca and Beadeca and the Herelings.
This thula gives us a list of 28 men (presumably heroes); as in the second
thula, they are listed in terms of the personal experiences of the speaker.
Such terms are to be taken as no more than a part of the mnemonic
machinery. In general, thula composition seems to have had a highly practical
purpose: that of making it easier to remember the names listed. It follows
that the names in the lists were thought worth remembering, and in fact the
mnemonic material given in the thulas is weighty matter. It meant much to a
West Saxon king that he trace his descent from Gewis, the eponym of the
tribe, and from Woden, the chief god of the tribe. We have reason to think
that his political hold would have been strengthened likewise by belief that
he had Wig and Freawine for ancestors, and we may presume that some of
the other names in his genealogy were meaningful to our forefathers even
though they are only names to us. In sum, the thula which gave Cynrics
genealogy was a political poem of the first importance. The upstart West
Saxon dynasty gained thereby in rank and worth: thenceforth its kings could
face as equals the kings of the ancient Mercian house.6 The importance of the
thulas of Widsith lay elsewhere. The first thula embodied historical, the second
ethnological lore; the third seems devoted to figures of story rather than (or
more than) history. And many names in all three presumably brought to
mind in the hearer things that we miss, or know little of. The artistic worth of
a list has always lain in the associations which its names evoke. Every name
is an allusion for those who know it, and a series of names makes a series of
6
Compare the Chadwicks, op. cit., p. 271, note 2.
34
Runic
Poem
allusions. The names gathered in the thulas of Widsith stand for a world now
long forgotten, the Germanic world of the migration period. Much of that
world still lived in the England of the Widsith poet, and the old thulas had
then a rich allusiveness which we see but darkly and know but in part.
Beside the thulas we set the Runic Poem, another example of mnemonic verse.7
Its practical value for would-be runemasters is comparable to that of ABC poems
for learners of the alphabet. The runes were learned by name, and in a fixed
order. The name of the rune gave one the clue to its phonetic value, and its place
in the sequence gave one the clue to other values which need not be gone into
here. It seems altogether likely that the runes from the first were learned by
means of a poem in which each runename began a section, though in the original
poem the sections may have been quite briefpossibly no more than a short
verse each. From this original poem the three runic poems extant were presumably
descended. For the Norwegian and Icelandic runic poems we refer the reader to
the edition of Dickins. The English, poem is much more elaborate than the other
two. We illustrate with the first section, devoted to the first rune:
Feoh by frofur fira gehwylcum;
sceal eah manna gehwylc miclun hyt dlan
gif he wile for drihtne domes hleotan.
Valuables are a joy to every man;
yet every man must needs be openhanded with them
if he is minded to win favor with the Lord.
Feoh is the name of the f-rune, and accordingly begins the section and sets
the stave for the first line of the section. Moreover, the section has feoh for its
theme. This theme is treated in a manner reminiscent of the riddles. We can
turn the section into a riddle, indeed, by putting ic eom for feoh by:
I am a joy to every man;
yet every man must needs be openhanded with me
if he is minded to win favor with the Lord.
The poem is 94 lines long. It consists of 29 sections, devoted to as many
runes: 19 three-liners, seven four-liners, two two-liners, one five-liner (the
last section). The section quoted above is representative of the whole, though
the run-on style is much more pronounced in some of the other sections. The
two-liners make up in length of line for shortness in number of lines. The
Runic Poem, like the thulas, started as a speaking, but in its present form it is
better classified as a writing. Its literary elaboration may well have taken
place under the influence of the riddles, of which more anon. If so, the poem
as it stands hardly antedates the eighth century and may be much later. The
eleventh-century MS Cotton Otho B x in which the poem came down was
lost by fire in 1731, and for our text we must rely on Hickes.8
7
8
The best ed. is that of B.Dickins, Runic and Heroic Poems (Cambridge. 1915).
G.Hickes, Linguarum Veterum Septentrionalium Thesaurus (Oxford, 1705), 1. 135.
35
Another notable piece of mnemonic verse, the Old English Menologium

or calendar poem,9 is recorded in the eleventh-century MS Cotton Tiberius B
I. This MS is commonly localized at Abingdon, but there are indications that
the menologist himself lived in Kent; note, for instance, the poets special
knowledge of the Canterbury minster (line 105). The poem is 231 lines long.
It is written in standard Old.English (i.e., West Saxon) of the later period,
and the poet seems to have flourished c. A.D. 1000. At the end of the poem
we are told what practical purpose it is meant to serve: now ye can find the
feast days of the saints that one is duty bound to keep in this kingdom (i.e.,
England) nowadays. For sources the menologist presumably used church
calendars and the like. The want of English saints in the poem10 indicates
that one was not then duty bound to keep their days; the older saints were
more important. But the poet gives much that he need not have included: the
four seasons and the English names of ten of the twelve months, with striking
poetical descriptions of nature attached.11 We think it possible that in making
his poetical calendar he drew not only on Latin sources but also on a now
lost native mnemonic poem of popular character, a poem in which the months
and seasons (but not the saints days) were named and characterized by
descriptions not unlike those of the Menologium.12 This possibility must serve
as our excuse for considering the Old English calendar poem in the present
chapter. In any case the menologist was no mere clerk, learned in Church
Latin only. He was steeped in classical Old English poetry, as his style and
choice of words reveal. Yet another example of mnemonic verse, Cynewulfs
Fates of the Apostles, will be taken up with the other works of that poet.
The English of old, unlike their Continental contemporaries, made legal records
in the mother tongue as well as in Latin. The laws of King elbirht of Kent were
set down in English as early as A.D. 602 or 603, and this kings example was
widely followed by English rulers of later times. Many charters, wills, and other
legal documents in the vernacular have come down to us as well.13 One of these,
9
Ed. R.Imelmann (Berlin, 1902); Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 4955. See also H.Henel, Ein altenglisches
Prosa-Menologium, in (Frsters) Beitrge zur englischen Philologie, XXVI (1934). 7191. The work
which Henel here edits is obviously a prose companion-piece to our poem, though it cannot be reckoned
literary and therefore will not be taken up in our chapter on Old English literary prose.
10
One English saint (Cuthbert) appears in the prose Menologium; see Henel, p. 71.
11
The months are not named (whether in English or Latin) in the prose Menologium, though the
seasons are duly named (in English).
12
The seasons in Old English: winter, lencten, sumor, hrfest. The months: earlier and later iula
(Dec. and Jan.), sol month (Feb.), hlyda (Mar.), easter month (Apr.), rymilce (May), earlier and later
lia (June and July), weod month (Aug.), halig month (Sept.), winterfylle (Oct.), blot month (Nov.).
The menologist gave only the Latin names of January and July, but the English names can readily be
inferred from those of December and June.
13
The best English editions of the laws are those of F.L.Attenborough, The Laws of the Earliest English
Kings, edited and translated (Cambridge, 1922), and A.J.Robertson, The Laws of the Kings of England from
Edmund to Henry I, edited and translated (Cambridge, 1925). A more complete edition is that of F.Liebermann,
Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen (3v. Halle, 19031916). Most of the charters and wills may be found in
the volumes of A.J. Robertson (Anglo-Saxon Charters, Cambridge, 1939) and D.Whitelock (Anglo-Saxon
Wills, Cambridge, 1930); these may be supplemented bv A.C.Napier and W.H.Stevenson, Crawford
Menologium
Legal
Verse
Hit
Becw
36
Hit Becw, is metrical throughout.14 It falls into 46 short verses, nine of

which were quoted above (p. 23). The text gives us the answer of a nameless
landowner to some plaintiff who had laid claim to the defendants land. It is
addressed, not to any court but to the plaintiff, who is told his claim has no
merit and is urged to drop the suit. More precisely, the defendant says: (Sec.
I) that the previous owner, now dead, had a clear title; (Sec. 2) that he, the
defendant, got it from the previous owner; (Sec. 3) that he, the defendant,
would never give it up to the plaintiff; (Sec. 4) that he would keep it all his
life, just as the previous owner had done without challenge to his ownership.
The fifth and last section reads:
Do swa ic lre:
beo e be inum and lt me be minum;
ne gyrne ic ines,
ne les ne landes,
ne sace ne socne,
ne u mines ne rft, ne mynte ic e nan Sing.
Do as I say: keep to thine and leave me to mine; I crave nothing of thine, neither
ground nor land, neither sake nor soke; neither hast thou need of mine, nor
have I aught in mind for thee.
The text is one of A.D. 1000 or thereabouts. For the historian of literature its
chief interest is metrical; note in particular the authors use of rime instead of
alliteration to bind together the two halves of the line beo e minum, a use
familiar in Middle English but rare in Old English alliterative poetry. As a
piece of self-expression, too, the poem is worthy of note. The author speaks
vigorously and to the point and makes his case come alive.
Many other legal texts are metrical in spots. Short verses, alone or in
series, are scattered here and there through the prose, and sometimes one
comes upon a line or even a series of lines. Thus, the author of Gerefa brings
his treatise to a metrical end:15
Fela sceal to holdan names gerefan
and to gemetfstan manna hyrde.
Ic gecende be am e ic cue;
se e bet cunne, gecye his mare.
Many things are required of a loyal overseer
and dependable director of men.
I have set forth [the subject] as best I could;
Let him who knows [it] better make more of it known.
ford Collection of Early Charters and Documents (Oxford, 1895), and F.E.Harmer, Select English
Historical Documents of the Ninth and Tenth Centuries (Cambridge, 1914). The earlier collections of
Thorpe, Kemble, and Birch are also still useful, though they must be used with caution.
14
See also Heusler, Altgerm. Dichtung, p. 66. For a contrary view, see Liebermann, III. 236.
15
Liebermann, I. 455.
37
The following passage from Rectitudines may also be quoted:16

Laga sceal on leode luflice leornian,
lof se e on lande sylf nele leosan.
The laws of the realm he must lovingly learn
who is unwilling to lose his good name in the land.
In the Gerefa passage the third line has only three lifts and the fourth follows
an alliterative pattern quite unusual though probably old,17 while in the
Rectitudines passage the alliteration foreshadows Middle English and ignores
classical Old English practice. Such irregularities are common in the linear
verse of legal texts. By its end-stopping too this verse is marked as nonclassical; here it harks back to earlier times. The short verses usually have a
two-beat pattern. Examples: ger ge dde ge dihtes both in act and in
aim (with alliteration); t rde ne t dde by rede nor by deed (with
rime). As the examples indicate, we have to do with traditional formulas of
one kind or another. Such tags are still common in legal phraseology, though
the modern tags more often than not are without alliteration or rime, and
consequently are not thought of as verse. Want of rime and alliteration in an
Old English tag does not mean, of course, that the tag is unmetrical; it means
that we cannot be sure of the tags metrical character unless the context
points to metrical treatment. The stock of verse formulas varied more or less
down the centuries; some old formulas went out, and others came in. Thus
the tag ne sace ne socne in Hit Becw is late. Metrically speaking,
nevertheless, it is of a piece with prehistoric English formulas, and its
introduction cannot be looked upon as a metrical innovation. Setting their
age aside, we classify the formulas in terms of the relationship between the
members. This relationship may be of sound or sense. In terms of sound, the
two members of a typical formula may be free (e.g., ne gyrne ic ines) or
bound by rime (e.g., landes ne strandes) or alliteration (e.g., ne plot ne ploh).
Again, they may be symmetrical (e.g., ne turf ne toft) or asymmetrical (e.g.,
ne furh ne fotml). A symmetrical formula may be simple (e.g., ne ruh ne
rum) or compound (e.g., on ceapstowe oe cyricware at marketplace or
churchmeeting). The members of a compound formula may be linked by a
common first element (e.g., oferseah and oferhyrde oversaw and overheard)
or second element (e.g., on scipfyrde, on landfyrde in ship-army, in landarmy); here the relationship is one of both sound and sense. The same holds
of complete identity (e.g., hand on hand hand in hand) and partial identity
in asymmetrical formulas (e.g., ne cyse ne cyslyb nor cheese nor cheeserennet). So also in cognate constructions (e.g., to rde gerdan advisably
advise, wisely decide). Meaningful relationships may be of contrast (e.g., r
oe fter before or after) or of likeness (e.g., healdan and wealdan hold and
16
Liebermann, I. 452. Other single or double lines will be found in I Cnut, 2 and 25 (Lieb., I. 280
and 304); II Cnut, 38 (Licb., I. 338); X clrcd, Prol. I (Licb., I. 269); Excom., 2 (Lieb. I. 438);
Geynco, 3 (Lieb. I. 456); etc.
17
See K.Malone, Beiblatt zur Anglia, XLVIII (1937). 351352.
Tags
38
Spells
and
Sayings
rule) or of mere association (e.g., manige menn many men). Other

classifications might be. made (have been made, indeed),18 but these will serve
well enough to bring out the characteristic features of the short verses.
The metrical formulas here taken up belonged, for the most part, to
everyday Old English speech, which made more use of short verses, and had
a greater awareness of the metrical side of speech, than is the case in current
English. If these short verses may be counted by the hundred in legal writings,
the reason is not far to seek: everybody uses stereotyped expressions but the
legal mind has a particular fondness for them. It was above all in legal texts,
then, that these fragments of popular metrical speech found place and held
out against the literary verse and prose which imposed itself nearly everywhere
else.19 Yet in a few spells and sayings likewise the popular verse-form managed
to keep a precarious foothold.
Versified wisdom, like versified tags and name-lists, is old in English; older
than the language, indeed. But it had to pay for the privilege of written record.
The clerics who wrote down what we have of it made fewer changes,
interestingly enough, in the spells than in the sayings. They presumably feared
that a spell would not work unless they kept the old wording, while they
knew a saying would hold good whatever the wording.
We begin with the supernatural or magical wisdom of the spells (or
charms). In Grendons collection,20 thirteen are wholly or partly in English
verse. Of these, two (A 21 and 22) are obviously variants of the same
spell. We thus have twelve spells to consider. Two survive in MSS of the
tenth century;21 nine are recorded in MSS of the eleventh century;22 one,
written in a hand of c. 1100, occurs in a MS of the tenth century.23 We have
no way of knowing who made these spells, when or where they took shape,
18
Liebermann, II. 7778. See also D.Bethurum, MLR, XXVII (1932). 263279.
See below, p. 101, for the rhythmical prose of lfric.
20
F.Grendon, The Anglo-Saxon Charms, Jour. of Amer, Folk,-Lore, XXII (1909). 105237. Item
A 15 II of the collection is not a spell but the legal poem Hit Becw, which we took up above.
21
From BM MS Regius 12 D XVII we have Wi Wterlfadle against waterelf sickness (Grendon,
B 5, p. 194; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 124125). From BM MS Harley 584 we have Wi Cynnel against
scrofula (Grendon, A 9, p. 170; see also F.P.Magoun, Jr., Arkiv for nordisk Filologi, LX [1945]. 98
106).
22
From BM MS Cotton Caligula A VII we have cerbot acre-boot, field-remedy (Grendon, A
13, pp. 172176; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 116118). From BM MS Harley 585 we have: (I) Wi Frstice
against a sudden stitch in the side (Grendon, A I, pp. 164166; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 122123), here
called Slice; (2) Wi Dweorh against a dwarf (Grendon, A 2, p. 166; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 121122);
(3) Wi Ceapes Lyre against loss of cattle (Grendon, A 22, p. 184; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 123), here
called Lyre when distinguished from its variant peofend but otherwise called Bethlem; (4) Nigon Wyrta
Galdor nine wort spell (Grendon, B 4, pp. 190194; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 119121), here called Wyrta;
(5) Wi Ltbyrde against slow birth (Grendon, E I, pp. 206208; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 123124),
here called Ltbyrd. From the Corpus Christi College Cambridge MS 41 we have: (I) Wi Ymbe
against a swarm of bees (Grendon, A 4, p. 168; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 125); (2) Sigaldor hap spell
(Grendon, A 14, pp. 176178; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 126128); (3) Wi Feos Nimunge against cattle
theft (Grendon, A 16, pp. 180182; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 125126), here called Garmund; (4) Wi
Ceapes eofende against cattle theft (Grendon, A 21, p. 184; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 126), here called
eofend when distinguished from its variant Lyre but otherwise called Bethlem.
23
Wi Wennum against wens (Grendon, A 3, p. 166; Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 128), BM MS Regius 4
A XIV. This spell will here be called Wenne.
19
39
and how (if at all) the originals differed from the texts we have, apart from
the ordinary linguistic changes down the years. We do not even know whether
our texts were drawn from oral or written sources, though their ultimate
source was presumably oral tradition. Strictly Christian spells like Bethlem
may go back to a heathen original, but we need not make this presumption,
since such spells might perfectly well have come into being in Christian times.
Heathen elements in the spells are presumably old. Christian elements may
reflect substitutions or additions. Much of the matter cannot be tied to religious
belief, and is better classified as pseudo-science. In this history we take up the
spells as examples of literary art, and leave to others the manifold non-literary
problems which a student of spells must face.24
Our spells make a literary group of their own, not only in subject-matter
but also in versification and style. They reflect a tradition independent of
classical Old English poetry, but allied to legal verse and to pre-classical endstopped linear verse.25 Nearly all our twelve spells include prose as well as
verse. In the verse parts a line may be followed by a short verse, a short verse
by a line. Alliteration may be heaped up, or may be wanting. A line may be
made up wholly, or almost wholly, of lifts. The three-lift verse, too, is in use
here: a verse-pattern longer than the short verse but shorter than the line. A
poem may show much greater variety in line pattern than would be possible
in classical poetry. Run-on lines are rare. The familiar classical device of
variation is avoided. We find, instead, repetition, and serial effects not unlike
those achieved in the thulas of Widsith or in certain passages of Beowulf
(e.g., lines 1392 ff., 1763 ff.). The epitheton ornans and other commonplaces
of the classical style are likewise rare in the spells. These vary much in literary
merit, but they all have freshness and go. We will look at a few of them.
The 13-line spell Wenne is marked by humor and lightness of touch. We
quote in modernized form the first four and the last three lines:
Wen, wen, wen-chicken,
here thou shall not build nor have any homestead,
but thou shalt [go] north from here, to the near-by hill.
There thou hast a wretch of a brother.
Do thou become as small as a linseed grain,
and much smaller, like a handworms hipbone,
and become so small that thou become nothing at all.
Note the humorous shift of stress in chicken, a shift which makes the word
rime with wen. The thrice repeated become is also of stylistic interest. But the
reader can make his own commentary.
24
There is a useful study by F.P.Magoun, Jr., Archiv, CLXXI (1937). 1735, with bibliography; see
also L.K.Shook, MLN, LV (1940). 139140.
25
Traces of strophic arrangement have been found by I.Lindquist (Galdrar, Gteborgs Hgskolas
rsskrift, XXIX [1923]), and F.P.Magoun, Jr. (ESt, LXXII [1937]. 16).
Wenne
40
Bethlem
The two variants of Bethlem have some importance for the textual critic,
and are therefore given here (the same translation will serve for both):
Lyre
Bleem hatte seo buruh,
e Crist on acnned ws.
Seo is gemrsod geond ealne middangeard.
Swa yos dd for monnum mre gewure.
eofend
Bethlem hatt seo burh e Crist on geboren wes.
Seo is gemrsod ofer ealne middangeard.
Swa eos dd wyre for monnum mre.
Bethlehem is called the town that Christ was born in.
It has become famous the world over.
So may this deed become famous in mens sight.
Garmund
Lyre gives us the better text, but the two non-classical verses with which it
began displeased somebody, and he made them into one line by putting geboren
for acnned. Evidently a Christian spell could not always hold its own against
the classical tradition.
The following passage from Garmund is quoted for its metrical and stylistic
features:
Garmund, godes egen,
find t feoh and fere t feoh
and hafa t feoh and heald t feoh
and fere ham t feoh
Garmund, Gods thane,
find the cattle and bring the cattle
and have the cattle and hold the cattle
and bring home the cattle.
Ltbyrd
Here the alliteration, the two three-lift verses, and the repetitions are worthy
of special note. The appeal to Garmund was addressed, one may suspect, to
Godmund in heathen times.
The verses of Ltbyrd have power and poetry beyond expectation. We find
space for a couplet only. A woman unable to feed her newborn child takes part
of her own childs caul, wraps it in black wool, and sells it to chapmen, saying:
I sell it, may ye sell it,
this black wool and seed of this sorrow.
Sigaldor
The four long spells are Sigaldor (40 lines), cerbot (38 lines of verse and
much prose), Wyrta (63 lines of verse, followed by a short prose passage),
and Stice (27 lines of verse, preceded and followed by a few words of prose).
Of these, the first seems wholly Christian; in style as well as matter it stands
41
closer to classical religious poetry than do the other spells. Among other
things it gives us lists of biblical worthies, a feature reminiscent of the thulas.
Except for a few lines it has little artistic merit. cerbot is Christian for the
most part, but has passages (often quoted) that almost certainly go back to
heathen times. Thus, the line eoran ic bidde and upheofon I pray to earth
and to high heaven has a strongly Christian context but nevertheless is
unmistakably heathen. The famous line,
cerbot
Erce, Erce, Erce, eoran modor,

whatever it means, surely appeals to mother earth, and the noble, hymn-like
passage,
Hal wes u, folde, fira modor,
beo u growende on godes fme,
fodre gefylled firum to nytte,
Hale be thou, earth, mother of men,
be thou with growing things in Gods embrace,
filled with food for the good of men,
takes us back to agricultural fertility rites, solemn ceremonies of immemorial
antiquity.
Wyrta names nine worts or plants that have virtue against poisons
(particularly snake-bite), aches and pains, infections, and demons.26 We are
told that these nine worts counteract as many devils, poisons and infections,
but no list of nine devils is given. We do get a list of nine kinds of poison,
followed by another list of six kinds of swelling or blister:
Now these nine worts are potent
against the red poison, against the runl 27 poison,
against the white poison, against the blue poison,
against the yellow poison, against the green poison,
against the dark poison, against the blue poison,
against the brown poison, against the purple poison;
against worm-swelling, against water-swelling,
against thorn-swelling, against thistle-swelling,
against ice-swelling, against poison-swelling.
Next comes a passage devoted to the cardinal points:
if any poison come flying from the east
or any come from the north
or any from the west over the people.
Nothing harmful was expected from the south, it would seem. The
passages quoted show the serial effects characteristic of the literary art of
the spells, an art marked by repetition and parallelism. The versification, too,
26
27
On the names of the worts, see H.Meroney, MLN, LIX (1944). 157160.
The meaning of runl is unknown, but it seems to be a color word.
Wyrta
42
with its mixture of line and short verse, is interesting. Running water also has
virtue, against snake-bite at least, and a couplet is added accordingly:
Ic ana wat ea rinnende
and a nygon ndran behealda.
I alone know running water
and that [i.e., running water] nine adders look to.28
The boast befits our learned spellman, but boasting is a conventional feature
of spells as of epics. The best known passage in this spell, however, has yet to
be quoted:
A snake came creeping, tried to slit a man open.
Then Woden took nine glory-rods;
then he struck the adder, so that it burst into nine.
Stice
This narrative or epic passage, done in the pre-classical end-stopped style,

is a precious relic of English heathendom; unluckily we do not know the
Woden myth which it summarizes.
Wyrta has come down to us markedly imperfect; perhaps the disorder was
there from the start. Stice, however, is well built as it stands. First come some
directions, in prose. Then we get a pseudo-scientific explanation of the stitch:
spear-casts made by evil spirits (female, it would seem) cause these sudden pains,
and the magic weapon must be drawn out of you before you can get relief. This
explanation is given in highly poetical dress: the women, loud and bold, have
ridden over the hill, overland; you must protect yourself to stave off this attack.
Here the spellman inserts, for the first time, the oft-repeated curative formula,
ut, lytel spere, gif her inne sie!
out, little spear, if thou be in here,
which also serves as a kind of refrain, marking the end of the passage. But
your shield fails you: the magic dart pierced you
when the mighty women drew up their forces
and [when] they hurled yelling spears.
The spellman now comes to help you. He promises to fight the evil spirits
with weapons of his own:
Six smiths sat,
murderous spears they made;
out, spear, not in, spear!
If there be in here a bit of iron,
the work of a witch, away it shall melt!
The incantation then proceeds in serial form (compare that quoted above
from Wyrta). The whole makes a little masterpiece of its kind.
28
The second line of this couplet agrees in alliterative pattern with the last line of Gerefa (see above, p. 36).
43
So much for the spells. We go on to the sayings. The term sayings is here
taken to mean versified words of stock everyday wisdom: short, pithy,
homespun generalizations about the common concerns of life, whether
proverbial, descriptive, or moralizing. The sayings that won record in Old
English times are found (1) imbedded here and there in a number of texts,
and (2) brought together in gnomic poems. Four such poems are extant.
Three of them are recorded in the Exeter Book, a MS of c. 980;29 they go by
the collective name Exeter Gnomics (206 lines in all, as usually reckoned),
and are distinguished by the letters A, B, C. The fourth, set down in the
eleventh-century MS Cotton Tiberius B I, is called Cotton Gnomics (66 lines).30
The imbedded sayings must first, of course, be winnowed out. Here the author
or compiler of the text may help us. Thus, the compiler of the (Latin) laws
attributed to Edward the Confessor quotes
Bugge spere of side oe here
buy spear from side or bear
as a proverbial expression current among the English.31 In the same way, a
nameless correspondent of St. Boniface (the great English missionary of the
eighth century) calls the following couplet saxonicum verbum:
Oft daedlata dome foreldit,
sigisitha gahuem; suuyltit thi ana.32
Oft a sluggard puts off decision,
Lets all his chances slip; so he dies alone.
More commonly, however, no such help is forthcoming, and we must go by
internal evidence alone. A gnomic passage once found, we need to know
besides (if possible) whether the generalization was original with the author
or common literary property. The latter is normally to be presumed, in virtue
of the traditional and conventionalized character of Old English literary art.
And sometimes we have special reasons for coming to this conclusion. Thus,
Beowulf, 1384b1385,
selre bi ghwm
t he his freond wrece onne he fela murne
it is better for every man
to avenge his friend than to mourn [over him] much,
29
Facsimile edition: The Exeter Book of Old English Poetry (London, 1933). Printed edition with
Old English text and modern English rendering: Part I, by I.Gollancz (EETS, 104); Part II, by W.S.Mackie
(EETS, 194).
30
The four gnomic poems are best studied in the edition of Blanche C.Williams, Gnomic Poetry in AngloSaxon (New York, 1914). Here, too, Miss Williams gives a thorough treatment of the imbedded sayings.
31
Liebermann, ed. cit., I. 638639. The popular character of this saying is reflected in its metrical
form; note the rime sperehere and the irregular alliteration. The saying seems to mean pay wergeld
or take the consequences, though the reference may equally well be to Danegeld or to tribute generally.
32
H.Sweet, Oldest English Texts, p. 152. The couplet (which we may name Verbum) is obviously
early, and keeps something of the old end-stopped style, but has a classical and even bookish ring; note
in particular the use of variation. We reckon it a writing, not a speaking.
GnomicVerse
44
Bedes
Death
Song
fits Old Germanic morality but clashes with Christian morality. It seems
unlikely, then, that the pious poet himself gave birth to this generalization;
the chances are that he was quoting a stock piece of popular wisdom, handed
down from heathen times.33
In studying the four gnomic poems we have to consider not only the
individual sayings which these poems embody but also the poems as such.
These are primarily compilations of traditional sententious wisdom, but the
clerical compilers have more or less remodeled their material to make it fit
the classical run-on linear style (though now and then they fail to do this and
the older versification stands out). Sometimes, too, we find a single saying
expanded or developed at some length, and not a few passages are homiletic
or reflective rather than gnomic in character. Christian piety has made its
way into the gnomic matter besides, and the poems as a whole give us a
remarkable mixture of old and new. While the nature of the material makes
a clean-cut structural pattern impossible, most of the sayings fall, more or
less loosely, into groups, and certain passages are built up systematically
enough. The sayings are so little organized in the Cotton Gnomics that the
old term gnomic verses seems appropriate; the gnomic monuments of the
Exeter Book, however, are properly poems rather than mere collections of
verses.34
Markedly different from all these is that famous piece of pious wisdom,
the so-called Death Song of the Venerable Bede (d. 735), preserved to us by
having been quoted in the Epistola Cuthberti de Obitu Bedae.35 The modern
rendering which follows is based on the text of the Epistola found in MS St.
Gall 254 (ninth century):36
Before the needful journey [i.e., death] no one becomes
wiser in thought than he needs to be
to think over, ere his going hence,
what of good or evil about his spirit,
after his day of death, may be decided.
This five-line poem of a single sentence evidently belongs to the classical, not
the pre-classical style of composition. The thought as it stands is Christian, and
Bede had Doomsday in mind. Yet the point of view needs but a slight shift to
give us words that would befit Bedes heathen forefathers, who prized above
all else that good name after death which may be had by living worthily, and
not otherwise. An old ideal of conduct here held its own by taking new shape.
33
For the sake of completeness we mention here two metrical proverbs, recorded in the BM MSS
Cotton Faustina A. x and Regius 2 B. v. One proverb comes to two lines, the other to one line of verse.
They are based on Latin originals. Texts in Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 109.
34
For a study of the structure of one of these poems, see K.Malone, MA, XII (1943). 6567.
35
The standard study of Cuthberts letter is that of E.V.K.Dobbie, Columbia Univ. Stud, in English
and Compar. Lit., CXXVIII. (1937). 49129.
36
The Death Song has been edited by A.H.Smith, Three Northumbrian Poems (1933), but this
edition needs a few corrections in the light of Dobbies study.
V
The Old Tradition: Courtly Poetry
So far, we have dealt with verse that reflects the traditional lore of oldest
England. Such verse was popular in that it belonged to the people as a whole.
We come now to verse more personal in character and more limited in aim.
At an early date Germanic kings began to keep professional poets, with
functions not wholly unlike those of the poet laureate or official poet of later
times. Among the English a court poet was called a scop or gleeman.1 We are
lucky enough to have in Widsith an early English poem on the scop.2 From
this poem (named after its hero) we learn something of the career and the
repertory of an ideal gleeman, creature of a seventh-century poets fancy.3
The poem consists of a prologue (9 lines), a speech by Widsith (125 lines),
and an epilogue (9 lines). The speech is built up round three old thulas and a
thula-fragment (47 lines in all; see above, p. 32), which the author puts in his
heros mouth; to these are added 78 lines of the authors own composition.4
Structurally the speech falls into five parts: an introduction, three fits or main
divisions, and a conclusion. Each fit comprises (1) a thula and (2) passages
added by the author.5 The thulas were put in Widsiths mouth to bring out
his knowledge of history, ethnology, and heroic story. Several of the added
passages serve the same purpose. Other passages bring out the heros
professional experience and first-hand information (as do the second and
third thulas); more particularly, they emphasize his success in his chosen calling.
Thus, we are told of his professional performances:
When Scilling and I, with sure voice, as one,
made music, sang before our mighty lord,
the sound of harp and song rang out;
then many a man, mindful of splendor,
those who well could know, with words spoke and said
that they never heard a nobler song, (lines 1038)
1
See L.F.Anderson, The Anglo-Saxon Scop (Toronto, 1903).

Recent edition: K.Malone, Widsith (1936). See also Lascelles Abercrombie, Widsith as Art, Sewanee
Rev., XLVI (1938). 124128. The edition of R.W.Chambers (Widsith, Cambridge, 1912) will always
remain the best presentation of nineteenth-century Continental Widsithian scholarship. This scholarship
is now largely out of date, because of the great advances made during the present century in our
understanding of the poem; for crucial particulars, see K.Malone, JEGP, XXXVIII (1939). 226228,
XLIII (1944). 451, and XLV (1946). 147152. But Chambers book still has more than historical interest.
3
For recent speculations about the author of Widsith, see especially W.H.French, PMLA, LX (1945).
623630.
4
Or 74, if lines 1417 be rejected, as they commonly are.
5
For a fuller analysis, see K.Malone, ELH, V (1938). 4966.
2
45
Scop or
Gleeman
Widsith
46
Even the critics thought highly of Widsiths art! From this passage we learn,
incidentally, that the scop sang his poems to the accompaniment of the harp.
Whether Scilling was Widsiths harpist or a fellow scop (in which case the
performance was a duet) we cannot tell; it has even been conjectured, indeed,
that Scilling was the name of Widsiths harp.6 The author makes it clear that
his hero was composer as well as performer (though he would hardly have
understood the distinction we make between these offices). Widsith sings in
mead-hall about his own experiences (lines 5456), and he composes and
sings a poem in praise of his patroness, Queen Ealhhild (lines 99102). We
may safely presume that an actual scop would do as much for the kings who
made him welcome at their courts and gave him gifts. The relationship between
a scop and his royal patron comes out in the epilogue of our poem:7
As gleemen go, guided by fortune,
as they pass from place to place among men,
their wants they tell, speak the word of thanks,
south or north find someone always
full of song-lore, free in giving,
who is fain to heighten his favor with the worthy,
do noble deeds, till his day is ended,
life and light together; below he wins praise,
he leaves under heaven a lasting fame, (lines 13543)
The word of thanks is to be taken as a poem in honor of the prince, whose
fame could hardly have been expected to last unless celebrated in song; poetry
was then the only historical record. We conclude that the scop had the
important function of immortalizing his patron by singing his praises. These
poems of praise, handed down by word of mouth, and making part of the
repertory of many a gleeman, were meant to keep the princes name and
deeds alive in the minds of men forever.
But the scop had another function, older and even more important: that of
entertainer. In Beowulf we get descriptions of the entertainment. From these we
gather that a gleemans performance was short, and made part of a celebration
which included amusements of other kinds. Thus, the royal scop sang one morning
out of doors, in an interval between horse-races (864918); the day before, he had
sung at a feast in the hall (489498). A given song might deal with contemporaries
(witness the gleeman who celebrated, the morning after the deed, Beowulfs
triumph over Grendel), or it might deal with figures of the past. But always, so
far as we know, its theme was high and its tone earnest. The entertainment which
the scop had to offer made demands on the audience; it could not be enjoyed
without keen participation in thought and feeling; there was little about it restful
6
W.J.Sedgefield, MLR, XXVI (1931). 75. In humbler circles the performer played his own
accompaniment, as we learn from Bedes story of Cdmon.
7
The metrical translations of Widsith 103108 and 135143 are taken, by permission, from
K.Malone, Ten Old English Poems (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1941).
THE OLD TRADITION: COURTLY POETRY
47
or relaxing. The scop held his hearers because he and they were at one: schooled
and bound in the traditions of a poetry that gave voice to their deepest loyalties
and highest resolves. The theme that moved them most was the theme of
sacrifice, dominant in the old poems and strong in the life which these poems
reflected and glorified. King and dright8 made a company of warriors held
together by the bond of sacrificial friendship. The king shared his goods with
the dright and took them into his very household; the dright shielded him
with their bodies on the field of battle, and if he fell they fought on, to victory
or death, deeming it base to give ground or flee when their lord lay slain. The
famous speech of Byrhtwold in Maldon tells us more than pages of exposition
could:9
Thought shall be the harder, heart the keener,
mood shall be the more, as our might lessens.
Here lies our earl, all hewn to earth,
the good one, on the ground. He will regret it always,
the one who thinks to turn from this war-play now.
My life has been long. Leave I will not,
but beside my lord I will sink to earth,
I am minded to die by the man so dear, (lines 31219)
But the theme of sacrifice need not take the form which it takes in Maldon.
And other themes might be used, as we have seen. Whatever the theme, the
old poems had strength in them to stir the heart and steel the mood. The
scop sang of heroes and called his hearers to the heroic life. He held out no
false hopes: heroism leads to hardship, wounds, and death. But though all
must go down in defeat at last, the fight is worth making: the hero may
hope for a good name among men. The value set upon the esteem of others,
and in particular upon fame, marks this philosophy social and secular
(heathen is hardly the word). The gleemen who taught it in song were
upholding the traditional morality of the English people, a way of life known
to us from the pages of Tacitus. The entertainment that the scops gave was
ei blot for lyst.10 The old poems, and the new ones composed in the same
spirit, kept alive for hundreds of years after the conversion to Christianity
the old customs, conventions, and ideals of conduct. In so doing they did
not stand alone, of course; many other things in English life made for
conservatism. But they had a great and worthy part to play in the
preservation of the nobler features of our Germanic heritage. It must not be
thought, however, that the scops were conservators and nothing more. It
was they who made the important stylistic shift from pre-classical to classical;
the clerics who produced most of the classical poetry extant simply carried
on and elaborated a style the basic features of which had already been
set by the scops. Moreover, the personal themes which the scops favored,
8
Comitatus, body of retainers.

From K.Malone, Ten Old English Poems (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1941), by permission.
10
Not merely for pleasure, the old motto of the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen.
9
King and
Dright
48
Deor
courtly though their setting and heroic though their appeal, opened the way
to the lyricism of Wifes Lament and Eadwacer.
Only one poem definitely attributed to a specific scop has come down to
us. This poem, commonly called Deor after its reputed author, is recorded in
the Exeter Book.11 The terminus ad quem of its composition is therefore A.D.
980 or thereabouts; a terminus a quo will be set below. The poem belongs to
the first stage of the run-on style. It is 42 lines long, and falls into seven
sections of varying length. The sections are all mutually independent; each is
complete in itself and could perfectly well stand as a separate poem, without
change. Nevertheless the seven sections make a well-knit whole, as we shall
see. We quote the last section, where the reputed author speaks in the first
person:
That I will say, of myself to speak,
That the Heodenings had me a while for scop,
the king held me dear; Deor they called me.
For many winters my master was kind,
my hap was high, till Heorrenda now,
a good man in song, was given the land
that my lord before had lent to me.
That now is gone; this too will go. (lines 3542)
The last line is the so-called formula of consolation. It tells us (1) that the
misfortune set forth in the other lines of the section has now been overcome
or outlived, no matter how; and (2) that the misfortune, whatever it may be,
of the present moment will pass likewise. The moral is: bear your troubles in
patience; they cannot last forever. In the section quoted, the author mentions
a misfortune of his own; in the first five sections, he mentions as many pieces
of adversity that befell others; each section gives us a new victim (or victims),
but ends with the same formula of consolation. The various misfortunes taken
up were drawn from Germanic story. This parallelism in theme, source, and
treatment links the sections and gives unity to the poem.
The sixth section, however, goes its own way. It reads,12
The man that is wretched sits bereft of gladness,
his soul darkens, it seems to him
the number of his hardships is never-ending;
he can bethink him, then, that through this world
God in his wisdom gives and withholds;
to many a man he metes out honor,
fame and fortune; their fill, to some, of woes, (lines 2834)
11
The only separate edition is that of K.Malone (1933). See also K.Malone, Acta Phil. Scand., IX
(1934). 7684, English Studies, XIX (1937). 193199, and MP, XL (1942). 118; L. Whitbread, MLN,
LV (1940). 204207, LVII (1943). 367369, LXII (1947). 1520.
12
The metrical translations of Deor 2834 and 3542 are taken, by permission, from K. Malone,
Ten Old English Poems (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1941).
49
This poetry is timeless and nameless. The victim of misfortune stands for
mankind in general, and his troubles are left unspecified. The consolation
offered has a correspondingly generalized character. We are told (I) that woe,
like weal, comes from God, who knows what is best for us, and (2) that our
troubles are of this world (and therefore sure to come to an end). The marked
differences between this section and the others have led many to reject it as
interpolated. But it sums up admirably the theme of the poem and seems
appropriate enough as a concluding passage. We incline to the opinion that it
was composed for that purpose. If so, the section with which the poem now
ends is best taken as an afterthought on the part of the poet. Certainly it
differs from the first five sections in that it is no allusion but a plain summary
account of the particular misfortune with which it deals.
Deor bears no likeness to the poems of praise that we hear about in Beowulf
and Widsith, and cannot be reckoned typical of the gleemans art. The last
section comes under the head of personal experience, however, and verses
dealing with such experiences are credited to Widsith, as we have seen. The
theme of Deor, then, does not lie outside a scops traditional range, though
the treatment shows marked originality and the poem therefore makes
difficulties for historians of literature, who can find no pigeon-hole into which
it will fit. If the reputed author actually composed the poem, the date of
composition could hardly be set later than the sixth century, and only one
section of his poem (the last) has survived: a sixth-century poet could not
have composed the general section with its Christian coloring, nor yet the
first five sections, which belong to a later stage of English poetic tradition, a
stage marked by the use of German sources (compare Waldere and Genesis
B). Most recent commentators have been unwilling to take the consequences
of a sixth-century dating, and therefore make the scop Deor into a literary
fiction, or, if historical, into a mere mouthpiece of the poet, not the poet
himself.13 The problems involved are too formidable for discussion here. It
will be enough to say that Deor as it stands cannot plausibly be dated earlier
than the ninth century and may have been composed as late as the tenth.
Another poem composed by a scop is that to which scholars have given
the name The Fight at Finns Borough,14 or Finn for short. Only a fragment
of this poem has survived: 46 lines and 2 half-lines. If the whole came to
about 300 lines,15 then we have somewhat less than a sixth of the text; if
the poem was longer, the part we have is proportionately smaller. Our
fragmentary text of uncertain date is known to us only from the faulty
13
R.Imelmann, Forschungen zur ae. Poesie (1920), pp. 254257, contends that the Deor poet was
familiar with the ninth eclogue of Virgil and gave himself a pen-name in imitation of Virgil.
14
The text of Hickes reads Finnsburuh (one word), but this can hardly be right; see F.P.Magoun,
Jr., Zeitschrift fr deutsches Altertum, LXXVII (1940). 6566. The poem is included in most editions
of Beowulf by way of appendix. B.Dickins also includes it in his Runic and Heroic Poems (Cambridge,
1915).
15
For this bold and doubtful conjecture, see F.Klaeber, Beowulf (3ed., 1936), p. 236.
Finn
50
transcription of Hickes;16 the manuscript leaf from which he took it has vanished.
A poem which dealt with the same events (possibly the very poem of which we
have a fragment) was known to the Beowulf poet, who calls it a gleemans
song (1160a). The author of Beowulf does not give us the text of this song, in
whole or in part, but from his own treatment of the theme (10631159a) we
learn something of the events on which the song was based. In style the Finn
episode of Beowulf is consonant (for obvious artistic reasons) with the poem
of which it makes a part, and differs correspondingly from the Finn fragment,
which belongs to the early stage of the run-on style (see above, p. 27). Episode
and fragment are not directly comparable in plot, since they deal with different
stages of the action. It is customary to reconstruct the plot of the old tale by
putting fragment and episode together. Unluckily the beginning of the action
nowhere survives, and can be reconstructed only by conjecture. In the following
summary of the plot, the conjectural items are bracketed:
King Hnf of the Danes, with 60 followers, is in Frisia, [on a visit to] his sister
Hildeburh, wife of King Finn of the Frisians. [Trouble arises between hosts and
guests. The Danes take possession of a hall at Finns seat, possibly Finns own
hall, and make ready to defend themselves. A Danish sentry (or wakeful warrior)
rouses King Hnf before dawn to report that he sees a light outside and to ask
what it means.] Hnf replies that an attack upon the hall is about to begin. He
rouses his men and they take their appointed places to await the onslaught. The
Danes hold the doors of the hall without loss to themselves for five days. Here
the fragment ends and the episode begins. The Danes go over to the offensive
[presumably in a sortie] but lose heavily, being reduced to a wealaf remnant of
disaster; King Hnf himself falls in the struggle. The Frisians too have had
severe losses, including Finns own son. The fight is a stalemate and Hengest, the
spokesman for the wealaf and its informal leader, comes to terms with Finn. The
Danes swear allegiance to Finn and are guaranteed the same rights and privileges
that Finns other followers have. In particular, anyone who taunts them for
following their lords slayer is to be put to the sword. The bodies of the fallen on
both sides are then burned with appropriate rites. Life at Finns court on the new
basis continues the winter through. With spring, travel by sea again becomes
possible, and Hengest is eager to go but his thoughts are not so much on the
voyage itself as on the vengeance he would like to wreak on the children of the
Eotens [i.e., the Frisians], Eventually Guthlaf and Oslaf [presumably with the
rest of the wealaf] get away by sea [to Denmark] and whet their compatriots at
home against Finn. A Danish fleet-army attacks and slays Finn at his stronghold
and bears off much booty to the ships. Queen Hildeburh goes back to her native
land with the Danish victors. We are not told what became of Hengest.
This is not the place to discuss the many problems of fragment and episode.17
We limit ourselves to the literary treatment of the theme. Both
16
G.Hickes, Ling. Vett. Sept. Thesaurus(1705). I; 192193.

For recent discussions, see K.Malone, ELH, x (1943). 257284; MA, XIII (1944). 8891; RES,
XXI (1945). 126127; and MP, XLIII (1945). 8385, together with the references to other studies
there given.
17
51
fights are mentioned in the episode, but obviously the interest of the Beowulf
poet centered, not in the fighting but in the tragic situation of Hildeburh and
Hengest during the period between the two battles. The hapless queen makes
a pathetic figure; husband and brother wage war against each other, and son
and brother fall, fighting on opposite sides. Hers is a womans tragedy; she
can do nothing to keep her nearest and dearest from killing each other. The
poet lays stress on her sorrow and her innocence. She did not deserve the fate
that befell her.
The tragedy of Hengest (and of the wealaf18 as a whole, for whom he
stands) strikes deeper. The Danes not only made terms with their lords slayer;
they actually entered that slayers service, became his men. This debarred
them from carrying out their last and most solemn obligation to Hnf: that
of avenging his death. Indeed, they were now honor-bound to defend Finn
against attack. The poet pictures Hengest in a kind of mental rebellion against
his unhappy fate. He is eager to see the last of Frisia, but above all he yearns
to wreak that vengeance on the Frisians which he cannot honorably wreak.
We are told nothing more about him, and we need not speculate on his further
activities. The tragedy of the wealaf as a whole, however, seems to have been
resolved by the voyage of Guthlaf and Oslaf to Denmark. Though the Danes
in Finns service could not honorably turn upon him themselves, they could
incite their fellow Danes to do so; such was the legalistic ethics prevalent in
those days among the Germanic tribesmen. Whether Finn let the wealaf go
that summer or whether they took advantage of an opportunity to desert, we
have no means of knowing. In any case Guthlaf and Oslaf could hardly have
made the voyage to Denmark without a crew, and the wealaf was the only
crew available.
What of the gleemans song on which the episode is based? Did its author
see eye to eye with the Beowulf poet? Here we must go by the fragment.
From this it would seem that the scop did not dwell on the early events and
was hurrying on to something else. Hnfs answer when he saw the light
outside,19
Here day dawns not, here a dragon flies not,
and here the horns of this hall burn not,
but here they bear forward, birds of prey croak,
the greycoat yells, the gory spear shouts,
shield answers shaft. Now shines this moon,
wandering, on the earth; now woe-deeds arise,
that will bring to a head this hatred between peoples.
But waken now, warriors mine,
take up your shields, think only of fighting,
join battle in front, be bold-hearted (lines 312),
18
Danish survivors.
The metrical rendering of lines 312 of the Finn fragment is taken, by permission, from K.Malone,
19
52
the manning of the doors (1317), the challenge and reply with which the
fight begins (1827), are done with breadth and leisure, but then the tempo
changes. The fight between challenger and defender, though elaborately
introduced, is not reported in detail; the scop finds it enough to tell us that
Garulf, the challenger (Finns man), lost his life, and even this information is
not given separately, but is incorporated in a brief description of the sounds
and sights that go with battle (2836). The course of the fight for five days is
then disposed of in six lines (3742) taken up chiefly with praise of Hnfs
following. The tempo slows again with the last lines of the fragment (4348),
which report, in indirect discourse, a dialogue between Hnf and a wounded
Dane. We surmise that the crisis of the battle is at hand, but here the fragment
breaks off. The Beowulf episode makes clear the further course of the struggle.
The Danes took the offensive after their long and successful defensive stand.
The object of their sortie may have been to win through to the shore and take
ship for home, or perhaps they had run short of water and needed a fresh
supply. Whatever their reason for sallying forth, the sortie cost them dear:
their king and many others fell and the company of sixty was reduced to a
mere wealaf of, say, twenty or thirty men. As total destruction loomed before
them, one of the retainers, Hengest by name, took command, not by inherited
right but as a born leader who rose to the emergency. Under his leadership
the Danes rallied, fought Finn to a standstill, and regained the shelter of the
hall, where they held out against all the forces Finn could bring to the attack.
In all likelihood the major part of the old lay was devoted to this stirring,
heroic struggle, with Hengest as hero. The expression Hengest himself in
line 17 of the fragment points to the centrality of this character in the poem,
and his actual centrality in the Beowulf episode completes the demonstration.
But we have no reason to think that the fighting proper was played down in
the lay as it is in Beowulf. On the contrary, the lay first of all told the story of
the battle, though of course the scops interest was not in military tactics but
in heroic deeds.
Hengests heroism, however real, was far from ideal, as the Beowulf episode
shows. The greatness of the man was marred by a tragic flaw. He and his
fellows of the wealaf, rather than throw away their lives round the dead
body of Hnf, as the code prescribed, chose to live on, and even to enter the
service of their lords slayer. Why should a scop celebrate such a man in
song? One may surmise that, the lay of Hengest was first composed and sung
by a scop in service at the Kentish court. If the Hengest of story was the man
who began the English settlement of Britain (and many scholars have been of
this opinion),20 the scops of the kings of Kent might be expected to sing his
virtues and to overlook or minimize his faults. And it is not without weight
that the hero Hengest appears in English but not in Continental story.
20
See especially E.Bjrkman, Studien ber die Eigennamen im Beowulf (Halle, 1920), pp. 6061.
53
The famous English scholar Alcuin in a letter of the year 797 (No. 124 in
Duemmlers edition)21 bears incidental witness to the existence of a song
about Ingeld, the unfortunate king of the Heathobards mentioned in Beowulf
and Widsith. This king sacrificed honor, love, and life itself in a fruitless
attempt to avenge a defeat which the Danes had inflicted upon his tribe.22
From allusions in extant literature and elsewhere we may infer with certainty
that many other songs composed by scops were once current in England,
though their texts have not come down to us. Sometimes the allusions give us
a good idea of the events celebrated in an old poem, but often we must go to
Iceland or Denmark or Germany for the story, and often we search in vain
for further information. It would be interesting and worth while to make a
list of songs once sung by English gleemen, but now lost. We find it safer,
however, to list some of the heroes that were celebrated in these lost songs. In
so doing, we begin with the Goths. The Gothic heroes fall into three groups:
early, middle, and late. The early heroes are those mentioned as such by
Jordanes, the sixth-century historian of the Goths, who tells us23 that their
deeds were celebrated in song. Three of these heroes, Emerca, Fridla, and
Wudga (Widia), find place in Widsith; presumably they became known to
the English through the scops. We add King Eastgota and his son Unwen to
the early group; they are later in date than the ancient heroes in Jordanes
list, but lived too early (third century) to be put with the middle group, and
the Widsith poet associates them with Emerca and Fridla. The chief hero of
the middle group, and of the Goths in general, is King Ermanric, who figures
largely in Widsith, and is mentioned in Beowulf and Deor. He flourished in
the fourth century. To the middle group also belong Wulfhere and Wyrmhere,
mentioned in Widsith as leaders of the Vistula Goths in their warfare against
the Huns; these heroes presumably flourished c. A.D. 400. The case of Hama
makes difficulties; in Widsith he goes with the early hero Wudga, while in
Beowulf he goes with Ermanric. In all likelihood Widsith gives us the older
tradition here, while the Beowulf allusion reflects the beginning of a process
carried through in later times, a process whereby the gigantic figure of
Ermanric drew various Gothic heroes into his circle, irrespective of chronology.24
21
Monumenta Germaniae Historica Epistolarum, IV (Berolini, 1895). 183. The passage may be
translated thus: The words of God are to be read at a corporate priestly meal. There it is proper to
hear a reader, not a harper; sermons of the fathers, not songs of the heathen. What [has] Ingeld [to do]
with Christ? Narrow is the house: and it cannot hold both. The heavenly king will not have to do with
so-called kings, heathen and damned, because that king reigns in heaven, world without end, while the
heathen one, damned, laments in hell See also No. 21, ed. cit., p. 59: audiantur in domibus vestris
legentes, non ludentes in platea readers in your houses, not players in the street are to be heard.
22
The tale of Ingeld is the subject of a Beowulf episode (lines 20142069a) and a Widsith passage
(lines 4749). See K.Malone, MP, XXVII (1930). 257276; Anglia, LXIII (1939). 105112; GR, XIV
(1939). 235257; ELH, VII (1940). 3944; JEGP, XXXIX (1940). 7692; and Essays and Studies in
Honor of Carleton Brown (1940), pp. 122.
23
Getica, cap. v.
24
Monograph: C.Brady, The Legends of Ermanaric (Berkeley, 1943); reviewed by K. Malone,
MLN, LIX (1944). 183188 and JEGP, XLIII (1944). 449453; by P.W.Souers, Speculum, xx (1945).
502507.
Lost
Songs
54
The only Gothic hero of the late period is Theodric, the conqueror of Italy;
he is mentioned in Waldere.25
Three Burgundian heroes are mentioned in Widsith: Gifica, Guhere and
Gislhere. The fall of Guhere in battle against the Huns may well have been
the subject of an English song. The Frankish hero Sigemund, son of Wls,
together with Sigemunds nephew Fitela, was celebrated in song by a scop,
according to the Beowulf poet, who gives us (lines 874897) some idea of the
deeds celebrated. But Sigemunds famous son Sigfrid or Sigurd seems to have
been unknown to the English, and the tale of the Wlsings was not combined
with that of the Burgundians as it was in the Icelandic Vlsungasaga and the
German Nibelungenlied. The Frankish king Theodric, eldest son of Clovis,
appears twice in Widsith and his rule over the Mrings (the Visigoths of
Auvergne?) is mentioned in Deor. He answers to the Hugdietrich of German
story.26 The Langobards held a high place in English song, if we may judge by
Widsith, where no less than six Langobardish heroes appear: the ancient
kings gelmund and Hun(d)gar, of whom a tale is told by Paulus Diaconus,
the historian of the Langobards;27 another ancient king Sceafa; two later
kings, Eadwine and lfwine, the Audoin and Alboin of the historians; and a
king or kemp Elsa otherwise unknown. Hagena, King of the Rugians, appears
in Widsith 21, where he is coupled with a certain Henden, King of the
Glomman. The line may well be an allusion to the Hild story, in which father
and lover fight about the lady.28 Wada, King of the Hlsings, was still sung in
Chaucers day, and his inclusion in Widsith indicates that the scops sang him
too. Many Scandinavian heroes, besides, figured in English song. We learn of
them chiefly in Beowulf, the major Old English poetic monument. Only one
English hero found much favor with the scops, it would seem, but they made
amends by composing two songs in his honor. King Offa, who ruled the
English in Sleswick, before their migration to Britain, won fame both as a
fighter and as a wife-tamer. His fight is told of in Widsith (3844); his marriage,
in Beowulf (19331962). At the opposite extreme from Offa stands King
Attila of the Huns, the only non-Germanic hero whom the scops celebrated
in song. We end our list with Weland the smith, the only mythological character
included (unless Wada and Sceafa are mythical, as some scholars think).29
The heroes listed have much in common. First of all, their nationality is
Germanic; even Attila may be looked upon as Germanic by adoption. For
25
If the Beadeca of Widsith is rightly identified with King Totila, we have another Gothic hero of
the latest or Italian period.
26
See K.Malone, in Acta Phil. Scand., IX (1934). 7684, and ESt, LXXIII (1939). 180184.
27
The tale answers, in part, to the Helgakviur of the Elder Edda; see K.Malone, Amer. Jour.
Philology, XLVII (1926). 319346, and MLQ, I (1940). 3942.
28
For the various versions of this and other tales referred to here, see M.G.Clarke, Side-lights on
Teutonic History in the Migration Period (Cambridge, 1911).
29
Many other names might be added (e.g., those of eponyms and others from the royal genealogies),
but we have given enough to serve the purposes of this history.
55
many centuries the English had enjoyed political independence, but culturally
they still belonged to a commonwealth of nations, the Germania of their
Continental forefathers. Within that commonwealth they were at home, and
felt the Goth, the Swede, the Langobard alike to be cultural fellowcountrymen. Secondly, the heroes all flourished in a period thought of as
heroic in some special or exclusive sense, though without definition. This
period ended with lfwine, the Langobardish conqueror of Italy. When it
began we cannot say with precision. The heroic period answers roughly to
the great migration of the Germanic tribes in the third, fourth, fifth, and
sixth centuries, a migration which overthrew the Roman Empire in the west
and ushered in the Middle Ages. For the Romans and the Romanized peoples
of western Europe this period was one of disaster; for the Germanic tribes it
was a period of glorious achievement, a heroic age indeed. Thirdly, the heroes
all fought their way to glory: their reputation was based on prowess in battle.
A king might win martial fame, it is true, by good leadership or good luck in
warfare, but personal courage remained the chief virtue of every hero, be he
king or kemp. Along with courage a king must have generosity; his dright.
loyalty to him. The two virtues went together: a niggardly king could not
win or keep loyal followers, and faithless followers could not expect generous
gifts from their lord. The king gained riches through inheritance and war; he
gave land, weapons, and other valuables away in order to build up a large
and loyal body of followers, by whose help he could win new victories and
fill or swell his hoard. A dright was recruited from the whole Germanic world;
the fame of a generous and victorious king would draw to his court many a
wrecca adventurer from many a tribe. The kings fellow-tribesmen
nevertheless made the backbone of his following. Fourthly, the heroes nearly
always belonged to the upper classes of society; they could and did boast of
distinguished fathers and forefathers. The society in which they lived, however,
aristocratic though it was, had hardly begun that differentiation of classes so
marked in the modern world: high and low thought and acted much alike;
they had much the same cultural background, viz., that of the peasant. One
may compare the peasant culture reflected in the Iliad and the Odyssey, a
way of life simple and dignified, with much form and ceremony upon occasion,
but with many freedoms (e.g., boasting) that good manners now forbid.
Much more might be said about these heroes and the songs in which their
heroic deeds found record, but we must go on to the tenth century, when
nameless followers of the tradition of the scops composed two poems of
praise which posterity has found worthy of admiration. These poems deal
with contemporary events, not with events of the heroic age, and so far as we
can tell they give us accurate historical information. They illustrate, therefore,
a feature not always found in works of literary art, but characteristic of the
tradition which the scops set going: the poet as historian.
56
Brunanburg
Under the year 937 in the Old English Annals is recorded a poem of 73
lines in praise of King Athelstan of England and his brother Edmund.30 The
occasion for the poem was a battle which the brothers fought and won at
Brunas borough (stronghold), against an invading force of Scots and Vikings,
led by Kings Constantine and Anlaf. The poet, after praising the brothers
and telling of their foes losses on the field of battle, goes on to praise the
English army:31
The West-Saxons
pressed on in force all the day long,
pushed ahead after the hostile army,
hewed the fleeing down from behind fiercely,
with mill-sharp swords. The Mercians withheld
the hard handplay no whit from a man
of those that with Anlaf came over the waves,
by ship invaded our shores from abroad,
warriors doomed to die in warplay. (lines 2028)
He continues with the flight of Constantine and Anlaf, told with relish and
elaborated with passages of exultation. The last section (lines 5773) falls
into three parts: (1) the triumphant homecoming of the brothers; (2) the fate
of the bodies of the slain; and (3) the following historical comment:
So vast a slaughter
of men never yet was made before this
on this island of ours with the edge of the sword
(if we take for true what is told us in books
or by the old and wise), since from the east hither
the Angles and Saxons came up, to these shores,
over broad waters sought Britain out,
the keen warsmiths, overcame the Welshmen,
the worshipful kemps, and won the land. (lines 6573)
The poem is done with high technical skill. The transitions in particular
show the poets mastery of his medium. Noteworthy, too, is a nationalism
which goes beyond loyalty to the kings person or to the reigning dynasty.
The reference to books, alongside oral tradition, marks the poet a clerk
rather than a scop and his poem a writing rather than a speaking.32 The
verses belong, however, to the tradition of the scops in matter and manner.
Like the scops, the author is not concerned to describe the course of the
battle in any detail; he has made a poem of praise which happens to be a
battlepiece as well because victory served as an occasion for praise. If this
poem falls short of greatness, brilliant though the poets performance, its
30
The best edition of Brunanburg is that of A.Campbell (1938).

The metrical translations from Brunanburg here quoted are taken, by permission, from K.Malone,
32
Reference to sources is of course a conventional feature, in writings and speakings alike.
31
57
occasion must take the blame, in part at least. Defeat, not victory, found the
old poets at their best.33
Such a defeat was the battle of Maldon, and the poem so named rises
magnificently to the tragic occasion. The battle was fought in the year 991 at
the estuary of the Blackwater (or Panta) in Essex near Maldon. The hero of
the poem is Byrhtnoth, Earl of Essex, leader of the English fyrd (militia); the
poet does not name the leaders of the Viking invaders. The text of the poem,
preserved in the Oxford MS Rawlinson B 203 (eighteenth century),34 has
come down to us incomplete: it wants both beginning and end. The beginning
presumably told of the arrival of the Viking fleet and the measures for defense
taken by the Earl. We have no way of knowing what form the end took;
possibly the author left his work unfinished. It seems unlikely that any great
proportion of the poem has been lost: the 324 lines that survive give us the
meat of the matter. Maldon (like Brunanburg) was presumably composed
shortly after the event which it commemorates: the fall of Byrhtnoth and his
dright in battle against the Danes at Maldon. The later differs from the earlier
poem markedlymuch more than the difference in theme would lead one to
expect. We illustrate with the transitions. The Maldon poet leans heavily on
the connective a then. In Brunanburg this connective does not occur (unless
line 53 gives us an instance); the earlier poet does his structural dovetailing
so deftly that he must shun a crude device like ait would spoil the finished
effect he aims at. But such deftness would defeat the purpose of the later
poet, who is telling a tragic tale with high simplicity; he gains his effects the
better for his loose composition.35 The action of Maldon divides naturally
into two parts: the course of the battle before (1184) and after (185325)
the fall of Byrhtnoth. Another two-fold division, equally natural, is that made
in terms of the heros generalship; here the turning-point comes at line 96,
when the Earl has made the mistake of withdrawing the holders of the
33
No less than 13 other poems, occasional in theme, were included in the. Old English Annals.
Seven of these deal with events of the tenth century; six, with events of the eleventh. Some of them
resemble Brunanburg in that they are panegyrics, done in correct classical verse. They lack the brilliance
and fervor of Brunanburg, however, and their shortness gives them something of an annalistic character.
The other poems incorporated in the Annals have a certain interest because of their departure from the
classical tradition in style and technic; one notes in particular the growing use of rime and the growing
freedom in alliteration (e.g., st need not be an alliterative unit). Their artistic worth is negligible. Some
of the 13 poems were presumably composed or quoted by the annalists themselves (more precisely, by
the original compilers of the annalistic material sent round to the monasteries); others seem to be
interpolations, or insertions made by readers. Note K.Josts demonstration (Anglia, XLVII [1923].
105123) that two of the poems were composed by Archbishop Wulfstan of York. Such compositions
led to the metrical chronicles of Middle English times.
34
Cotton Otho A XII, the old MS in which Maldon found record, was badly burned in the fire of
1731; only fragments remain. Luckily J.Elphinston had copied the poem several years earlier. His
copy, now in the Rawlinson collection at Oxford, has served directly or indirectly, as the basis for all
editions of the poem. The latest and best separate edition of Maldon, that of E.V.Gordon (London,
1937), is based directly on Elphinstons transcript.
35
The same striving for naturalness comes out in the Maldon poets preference for the early stage
of the run-on style, and in his departures from the rigorously classical versification and technic favored
by the Brunanburg poet. The freedoms found in Maldon, be it added, mark no breakdown of the
classical tradition; they exemplify, rather, normal and proper variation within that tradition.
Maldon
58
ford and letting the Vikings cross the river. The two schemes of division may
be combined into a threefold scheme: first the English have the upper hand
(195) ; after Byrhtnoths mistake in generalship but before his fall, the issue
of the battle hangs in the balance (96184); after his fall the English lose the
day (185325). The heros fatal error grew out of his martial spirit, to which
the foe cunningly and successfully appealed. Here lies the tragic flaw which
made possible the catastrophe. But it was the flight of the cowardly Godric,
mounted on the heros horse, that precipitated and ensured defeat for the
English. Others followed his example (many misled by his mount into thinking
it was the Earl himself that fled) and the faithful retainers who stood their
ground were left in hopeless case. To their stand lines 202325 are devoted,
over a third of the poem. But this proportion should not mislead us. The
thane who dies fighting to the last by his lords body makes a noble figure, a
figure that the scops loved to draw, but he is not a hero in his own right. His
devotion typifies that of the dright as a whole, and serves to exalt the lord
who won such loyalty. Earl Byrhtnoth is the hero of Maldon. But the poet
does more than glorify a hero. He glorifies the institution: the relationship of
lord and dright that gives rise to the heroism which he celebrates. The poem
belongs to the tradition of the scops, and most of it might be put back into
heathen times with little or no change in word or thought. Only one truly
Christian passage occurs, the prayer of the dying hero:
I thank thee, O God, Governor of peoples,
for all the blessings that on earth were mine.
Now, mild Master, I most have need
that thou grant to my ghost the grace of heaven,
that my soul have leave to seek thee out,
depart in peace, pass into thy keeping,
Prince of angels. I pray it of thee
that the fiends of hell afflict her not.36 (lines 17380)
These moving words befit the hero, who, as we know from history, was a
man of deep Christian piety. He and the cleric who composed the poem in his
praise held warfare righteous if in a good cause, and what better cause could
be found than defense of church and state, hearth and home against heathen
invaders? Our poet upheld and glorified the heroic traditions of his forefathers
with a clear conscience; he felt no conflict (in Byrhtnoths case, at least)
between these traditions and Christianity.
The heroic point of view, and the stylistic conventions that go with it, are
manifest in the poets account of the fighting. The battle in Maldon, like the
battles in the Iliad, takes the form of single combats between champions; the
common soldiers are ignored. Over a fourth of the poem is made up of
speeches. Contrast Brunanburg, where neither single combats nor
36
Taken, by permission, from K.Malone, Ten Old English Poems (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press,
1941).
59
speeches occur. Both poems are properly described as poems of praise, but
they evidently represent different species of this genus. Maldon bears some
likeness to the epic, Brunanburg to the panegyric of the ancients. The
differences, however, are too great to admit of southern inspiration in either
case. We must presume, rather, a differentiation within the tradition of the
scops.
VI
Religious Poetry: Cdmon and His School
English religious poetry begins with a sharpness unusual in the history of
literature. An elderly illiterate farmhand of Yorkshire, Cdmon by name,
who had never learned how to make verses and would flee for shame when,
at entertainments, his turn came to sing, suddenly began to compose poems
of a kind hitherto not known in English: religious narrative verse on themes
drawn from Holy Writ. The story of Cdmon is told in Bede;1 it is so familiar
that we need not tell it again here. Cdmon served as lay brother and, later,
as monk in a monastery at Strenshalc (Whitby?) under the abbess Hild; his
literary activity thus falls between the years 657 and 680 (Hilds term as
abbess). Bede gives a Latin paraphrase of Cdmons first poem, the so-called
Hymn, and texts of the poem in a dialect of the Northumbrian English native
to the poet have come down to us in MSS of Bedes work. The following
translation into modern speech is based on the Moore MS text, printed in
A.H.Smiths edition:2
Now [we] shall praise the heaven-realms Keeper,
Gods might and his mood-thought,
the work of the glory-Father, as he of each wonder,
the eternal Lord, the beginning ordained.
He first made to the children of men
heaven for roof, the holy Creator.
Then the middle-yard mankinds Keeper,
the eternal Lord, afterwards created
for men, the earth, the Ruler almighty.
Hymn
This poem obviously belongs to the early stage of the classical run-on style
(see above, p. 27); every line but the eighth ends with a pause, and every
sentence ends with a line. The poet made use of a fully developed system of
variation. He adapted the technic of the scops to his own purposes neatly
enough: royal epithets like ruler, lord, Keeper became epithets for God by
qualification with almighty, eternal, mankinds and heaven-realms. To speak
more generally, Cdmon took God for his theme and sounded his praises
much as a scop would sound the praises of his royal patron. And just as the
scop celebrated the heroic deeds of the prince he served (or of that
1
Hist. Eccl. iv. xxiv.

Three Northumbrian Poems (1933), pp. 38, 40. But the editors punctuation might be improved.
For the history of the text, see E.V.K.Dobbie, Columbia Univ. Stud, in English and Comp. Lit., No 128
(1937), pp. 1048.
2
60
RELIGIOUS POETRY: CDMON AND HIS SCHOOL
61
princes forefathers), so Cdmon celebrated the glorious works of the prince

he served: namely, God. As Bede informs us,
he sang about the creation of the world, and the origin of mankind, and the whole
tale of Genesis; about the exodus of Israel from Egypt and entry into the Promised
Land; about many other tales of Holy Writ; about the incarnation, passion,
resurrection and ascension into heaven of the Lord; about the coming of the Holy
Ghost and the work (doctrina) of the apostles. He made many songs, too, about
the terror of doomsday to come and the horror of hell-fire but the sweetness of
the kingdom of heaven; but also many others about divine benefits and judgments.
Thereby the pious poet provided the body of monks with entertainment
suitable for the monastic refectory, though modeled after the worldly
entertainment with which the scops had long regaled the body of retainers in
the royal beer-hall.3 Like the scops again, Cdmon could not read or write,
and learned by word of mouth the stories he put into verse. But his poems, in
virtue of their matter, were deemed highly edifying, and scribes took them down
from the first. The poems of Cdmon make a bridge between speakings and
writings: they were composed as speakings, but at once became writings too.
We cannot point to any particular source of Cdmons Hymn, other than
divine inspiration and Christian tradition.4 There exists, however, in the
Bodleian library at Oxford, a famous MS called Junius II and made up of
verse obviously based, for the most part, on Holy Writ.5 This verse was long
attributed to Cdmon, although nowadays it is customary to put the poems
of the Junius MS under the head school of Cdmona label which denies
their Cdmonian authorship. We take up these and related poems here. The
MS as it stands is divided into two books: the first given over to verse dealing
with Old Testament story; the second, to verse about Christ and Satan.
According to Gollancz (p. xviii).
The writing of Book I belongs to the last quarter of the tenth or the early years
of the eleventh century. No long interval divided the writing of Book II from
that of the earlier portion.
Book I was done by one scribe, who had no hand in the copying of Book II,
carried out by three scribes less than a generation6 later. Many leaves have
been lost from Book I, which therefore has come down to us markedly
incomplete; in Book II no such losses took place. Book I is profusely
3
But worldly poems composed by scops were still being sung in refectories long after Cdmons
day, as we learn from Alcuins letter (see above, p. 53). The performer of such a song might be a scop
turned monk, or a scop who was spending the night at a monastery. We do not know to what extent (if
at all) court poets, or others who followed the courtly tradition, gave performances for the general
public (at markets and like places).
4
But see Sir Israel Gollancz, facsimile ed. Cdmon MS (Oxford, 1927), pp. lxi-lxii.
5
Edition of MS: see Krapp-Dobbie I. Editions of individual poems: F.Holthausen, Die ltere Genesis
(Heidelberg, 1914); B.J.Timmer, The Later Genesis (Oxford, 1948); F.A.Blackburn, Exodus and Daniel (Boston,
1907); M.D.Clubb, Christ and Satan (New Haven, 1925). See also Clubb, MLN, XLIII (1928). 304306.
6
Clubb, ed. cit., p. xii.
Junius
MS
62
illustratcd, though the artists did not finish their work, leaving many pages
blank; Book II is written solid except for the lower half of two pages. We set
the second book aside for the moment. The MS text of the first book is
divided into 55 fits. With fit 42 the tale shifts from Genesis to Exodus; with
fit 50, from Exodus to Daniel. Modern philologists accordingly divide the
book into three independent poems. Genesis, the first of these, is by far the
longest; it comes to 2936 lines.
Genesis
Genesis
A and B
The poem opens with a few lines in praise of God, lines which lead naturally to
a short passage in which is depicted the happy lot of the angels in heaven. Next
we are told of the discontent and rebellion of Satan and his crew, Gods wrath,
the creation of hell to house the rebels, their overthrow and expulsion from
heaven, and Gods design to make the world as a means of filling with better
people (95) the space left empty in heaven by the transfer of the wicked angels
to their new abode.
The better people were presumably the souls of the blessed, the elect of the
seed of Adam (as yet uncreated). The world was to be made as a breedingplace
for these. Pope Gregory the Great gave a like interpretation to the story of
the fall of the angels, and our poet doubtless got his ideas on the subject,
directly or indirectly, from Gregorys writings. With line 103 the story of the
world and man begins, a story based on the biblical narrative; more specifically,
the poets source was St. Jeromes Latin translation of the Scriptures,
commonly called the Vulgate. This the poet follows faithfully from its
beginning to Gen. 22:13; here the poem breaks off. We do not know whether
it was left unfinished or once had a continuation now lost.
Through loss of MS leaves our text has gaps in several places. Lines 235
851 do not belong to the poem at all, but make a great interpolation taken
from a later poem on the same subject; this poem was an English version of
a Low German (more precisely, an Old Saxon) original. We therefore
distinguish between the Earlier Genesis or Genesis A (lines 1234 and 852
2936) and the Later Genesis or Genesis B (lines 235851). Of the later
poem only that part survives which was interpolated into Genesis A; of its
original, three fragments survive, one of which answers to lines 790817a
of the interpolation. The beginning of Genesis B is lost, but the interpolated
verses from it dealt with the temptation and fall of Adam and Eve: Gen.
2:1617 and 3:17. Into this story the German author had inserted an
account of the fall of the angels, and our text therefore gives us two versions
of this event: the rather short and simple version at the beginning of Genesis
A, and the long, striking version in Genesis B. Of the two Genesis poems,
the later has great poetic power; indeed, the speech of Satan to the fallen
angels bears comparison with Paradise Lost in vigor if not in finish. The
poet of Genesis A outdid his German fellow in craftsmanship but lacked his
genius, and the poem is hardly what one would expect of Cdmon. It is
worthy of particular note that Bedes list of Cdmons poems begins, not
63
with the fall of the Angels, but with the creation of the world. From Bedes
list and discussion one gathers, further, that Cdmons poems, like those of
the scops, were many and short, not few and long. By its shortness the
Hymn, Cdmons authorship of which is certain, lends support to this
interpretation of Bedes words. Moreover, the Hymn belongs to the early,
Genesis A to the middle stage of the run-on style. We conclude that
Cdmon hardly composed the latter poem, though its author may well have
been inspired by Cdmons songs to undertake a metrical paraphrase of
Genesis which would differ from Cdmons work by reproducing the
sacred text in detail. Such a reproduction would of necessity make a long
poem, and long poems of this kind would win favor among the clerics, at
the expense of short poems, because of their completenesslittle or nothing
said in Holy Writ, however trivial or by the way, was left out. Again, though
both short and long poems were composed for didactic entertainment in
refectory, the long poems presumably followed the pattern traditional for
monastic meals: they were meant to be read aloud, not sung to the
accompaniment of the harp. Certainly the middle and late stages of the runon style do not go well with musical performance. Ecclesiastical authority
might be expected to favor poems for reading, as against poems that were
performed after the secular courtly fashion; the latter, though not worldly in
theme, had at least a touch of worldliness in performance. It was the
practice of reading aloud, we may add, which made possible the rapid
development of the run-on style in Old English poetry, freeing the poet as it
did from the limitations imposed by musical performance. And the taste for
long poems, aroused by the metrical paraphrasts and nourished by study of
the neid, led to extended treatment of secular themes like those of
Beowulf and Waldere.
With Bradley7 we think that the author of Genesis A was a clerk who, as
he wrote, had before him a copy of the Vulgate. But he had other sources
besides. Gollancz has noted (p. lvii) that
in the poets treatment of Genesis generally, one can trace the use of commentaries
and legendary additions, as for example, the story that the raven sent out from
the ark perched upon the floating bodies of the dead and so did not return,
and we saw above that the poet began with the fall of the angels, a story
which he did not find in Genesis. Moreover, he drew freely from the
tradition of the scops, not indeed for matter but for stylistic motifs and
devices, and phraseology in general. Thus, the battles of Genesis are
described after the manner of the scops. We quote the following passage by
way of illustration:
7
Collected Papers of Henry Bradley (Oxford, 1928), p. 248. In DNB, VIII. 200, Bradley put the
matter thus: a servile paraphrase of the biblical text can only have proceeded from a writer who was
able to read his Latin Bible; to a poet who, like Cdmon, had to depend on his recollection of
extemporised oral translation, such a performance would have been absolutely impossible.
64
There was hard play there,

exchange of deadly spears, great roar of battle,
loud war clamor. With hands they drew,
the heroes, from sheaths the ringed swords,
the strong-edged [swords]. There it was easy to find
booty for the fighter who had not had
enough of combat, (lines 198995)
Exodus
Typical here is the description of the victor: the one who wins booty (i.e., the
battle) is the one who is not willing to stop fighting. Dogged does itsuch
was the spirit of the English then, even as now. The earlier Genesis, whether
by Cdmon or not, is commonly reckoned a product of the Northumbrian
school of poets which Cdmon brought into being, and is commonly dated
c. 700. The later Genesis cannot be earlier than its German original, a poem
of the ninth century, and cannot be later than the Junius MS. We know nothing
of the translator.
The second poem of Book I is known as Exodus; it has no name in the MS.
It is 591 lines long by the reckoning of Blackburn, who in his edition rightly
followed the pointing of the MS; earlier editors printed the poem in 589 lines.
We divide the text into the following parts: an introductory period on the Mosaic
law (17); an epitome of the career of Moses (829); a sketch of events in Egypt
that led up to the departure of the Hebrews (3055); the march of the Hebrews
to the Red Sea (56134); the Egyptian pursuit and the rearguard set by the
terrified Hebrews (135246); the passage of the Red Sea and the destruction of
the Egyptian army (247515); conclusion (516591). 8
A digressive or episodic passage of more than 80 lines (362446) on Noah

and Abraham follows the description (310353a) of the order of march of
the Hebrew tribes; a short passage (353b361) on the common ancestry of
the tribes serves to tie the digression, loosely enough, to the main story. Through
loss of MS leaves the text has two serious gaps: one between lines 141 and 142
and one (fit 48) between lines 446 and 447. The poets theme is not Exodus as
a whole but the passage of the Red Sea by the Israelites, or, better, the heroic
leadership of Moses in this passage. Noteworthy are lines 208 ff., in which the
despair of the fugitives at the approach of the Egyptian host changes to courage
when Moses bids them make up their minds to perform deeds of valor (218b).
Unluckily the battle-scene (fit 48) is lost. The poet gives much space to speechmaking by his hero; the speeches are reported now in direct, now in indirect
discourse. In general, the poet follows English heroic tradition: Moses answers
to a Germanic king and the picked fighters of the Hebrews answer to a Germanic
dright. For his story the poet relies chiefly on chapter 14 of Exodus. A few
verses elsewhere in Exodus are used too, and some use is made of other books
of Moses, notably Genesis. But the author goes much further afield. Modern
8
The conclusion makes problems too involved for discussion here; see Gollancz, pp. lxxv lxxix,
whose conjectural rearrangement of the lines cannot surmount the obstacle of swa 549.
65
investigators have emphasized his learning and his originality, as reflected in

style and in sundry details of the text.9 The freedom with which he treated his
main source finds extreme illustration in lines 447515, based on a single Bible
verse: Exod. 14:28. The half-line flod blod gewod blood filled the flood
(463b) reveals a fondness for striking metrical effects. Now and again the poets
wording seems fanciful or even strained, as when he calls the Hebrews seamen
(333) because they were crossing the Red Sea (on foot). But it would be a
mistake to reckon the poem precious;10 it departs somewhat from the classical
mean characteristic of most Old English poetry, but remains traditional on the
whole. The difficulties which the text makes come chiefly from its faulty
transmission, and for this the poet cannot rightly be blamed. Date and authorship
are unsolved problems. Gollancz was so impressed by the poets learned
preciosity (as he took it) that he suggested authorship if not by Aldhelm, then
by one of his school, and certainly by a kindred spirit (p. lxix), but he admitted
that the text bore marks of Anglian origin. The scanty evidence points to a
Northumbrian clerk of the Age of Bede, when learning was at its height in Old
England. Since the poem belongs to the middle stage of the run-on style, it can
hardly have been composed earlier than c. 700.
The third and last poem of Book I is that called Daniel. It has no title in
the MS. By Blackburns count it comes to 764 lines; earlier editors wrongly
made two lines of line 224.
Author or scribe divided the text into six fits. The first of these falls into two
parts: an introduction, on Hebrew history down to the war with Nebuchadnezzar
(141a); and the story of that war, with its consequence, the Babylonian captivity
of the Jews, to which is added an account of the three Hebrew children, Hananiah,
Mishael, and Azariah, with their training for Nebuchadnezzars service (410
103). The second part of the fit is based on the first chapter of Daniel, much of
which, however, the poet leaves out; in particular, he fails to mention Daniel.
The next fit likewise falls into two parts: it begins with a condensed paraphrase
(104167) of Daniel 2, in which we learn of Nebuchadnezzars first dream (about
the image) and Daniels success with it after the Chaldean wise men had failed;
then comes a versification of Dan. 3:118, the story of the golden image which
the king sets up and which the three Hebrew children refuse to worship, though
the king threatens to cast them into a fiery furnace (168223). Through loss of
a MS leaf the poets paraphrase of Dan. 3:26 is wanting here. The third fit falls
into three parts: first, a paraphrase of Dan. 3:1927, telling how the king carried
out his threat and how an angel came down into the furnace and saved the
children (224278); next, the apocryphal prayer of Azariah (279332); last,
a repetition of the rescue story, the angels coming being represented
9
Obviously he knew his way about in a monastic library, with its Latin classics, Church fathers,
martyrologies, commentaries and miscellanies. In particular, he has been credited with knowledge of
Avitus, Sedulius, Jerome, Josephus, Augustine, Bede, and Ealdhelm. The following studies are worth
listing: L.L.Schcking, Untersuchungen, etc. (Heidelberg, 1915); S.Moore, UP, IX (1911). 83108;
J.W.Bright, MLN, XXVII (1912). 1319 and 97103; R. Imelmann, Forschungen etc. (Berlin, 1920).
10
Imelmann, op. cit., pp. 390408, gives a needful corrective for the extravagances of Schcking
and his followers.
Daniel
66
as in answer to Azariahs prayer (333361). The fourth fit too falls into three
parts: it begins with the apocryphal Song of the Three Youths in praise of God
(362408), continues with a paraphrase of Dan. 3:2429, in which the story of
the angel is told a third time (409485), and ends with a passage of transition to
the next fit (486494). The fifth fit versifies Daniel 4, telling of Nebuchadnezzars
second dream (about the tree) and Daniels interpretation (495674). The last
fit versifies Daniel 5, on Belshazzars feast (675764); through loss of a MS leaf
the end of this fit is missing. The poet seems not to have versified the story of
Daniel in the Lions Den (Daniel, 6).
Daniel
A and B
Azariah
The second and third parts of the third fit make an interpolation into our
poem. We therefore distinguish Daniel A (1278 and 362764) and Daniel B
(279361). The former poem belongs to the early stage of the run-on style.
This may mean that it was composed early, but its author may have lived
later and used the older style simply because he preferred it. The poem is no
masterpiece, but shows good workmanship; the transi tions especially are
well done. The old link between fits three and four is lost, replaced by the
interpolation. The repetitious treatment of the angel in Daniel A makes
problems too knotty for this history. The poet does not follow his source
slavishly; he leaves much out, and sometimes puts things in, as when he has
Nebuchadnezzar wake up from a drunken sleep (116). He expands freely
when he likes, and even includes a lyric piece: the Song of the Three Youths.
His source here was not the Vulgate, but a canticle the Latin text of which is
preserved in the so-called Vespasian Psalter.11 We have no evidence, however,
that the poets English version of the Song once existed free of its setting in
Daniel A. The Song does not fall into five-line stanzas, as some have
maintained. Daniel A presumably goes back to early Northumbria (c. 700?).
The interpolator took Daniel B from a poem which the philologists call
Azariah.12 A copy of this poem has come down to us in the Exeter Book.
More precisely, the compiler of that MS miscellany included part of a poem
on the third chapter of Daniel, presumably the part he liked best; certainly he
left out the beginning, for his text begins, abruptly enough, with the
introduction to the prayer of Azariah. The part preserved in the Exeter Book
comes to 191 lines. Of these, lines 2829 make what is left of a defective
passage that answers to Daniel, 307312; the missing words were recorded
on the lost part of folio 53.
The poem as we have it consists of the introduction to the prayer of Azariah (1
4), the prayer (548), the rescue by the angel (4967a), the introduction to the
Song of the Three Youths (67b72), the Song (73161a), the outcry of the heathen
at the miracle (161b165), the report of the miracle, made to Nebuchadnezzar
by his eorl (166179a), and the kings reaction: he went to see the miracle
11
H.Sweet, Oldest English Texts (EETS, 83). pp. 414415. The canticle was drawn from the Roman
Breviary.
12
Ed. W.Schmidt, Bonner Beitrge, XXIII (1907). 4048. See also editions of the Exeter Book. The
latest of these is Krapp-Dobbie, III.
67
with his own eyes and then told the youths to come to him, whereupon they left
the furnace in triumph (179b191).
Daniel B is so like Azariah, 172 that we cannot speak of two poems but
must reckon the two texts mere variants of the same original. The likenesses
of Daniel A to the corresponding parts of Azariah need another explanation.
The evidence indicates that the Azariah poet had before him, not only the
Vulgate text but also a copy of Daniel A. This copy he drew upon freely at
the beginning of the Song of the Three Youths, but less and less as he proceeded;
in making his version of the Song he followed the Canticle text but took the
Vulgate text into account as well. He expanded his sources with reflective
and devotional matter much more freely than did the Daniel poet. We reckon
the report of the eorl to Nebuchadnezzar a piece of conventional English
heroic machinery; it may have been suggested by the speech of the counselor
in Daniel A (416 ff.), but bears little likeness to that speech. Azariah belongs
to the middle stage of the run-on style. It was composed later than Daniel A,
and earlier than the time of compilation of the Exeter Book. Its author followed
in the tradition set going by Cdmon, and may well have been a Northumbrian
clerk, but of this we cannot be sure. If he was Northumbrian, his poem can
hardly have been composed later than c. 875.
Another poem based on Old Testament story is Judith; it has come down
to us in the Nowell codex, BM Cotton Vitellius A XV, 2d MS (late tenth
century).13 The poet had for source the Vulgate text of the apocryphal book
of Judith. Unluckily only the last part of the poem survives: 348 lines and 2
half-lines, making a little more than three fits. If we go (as we must) by the
MS numbering, the complete poem made at least 12 fits; the fragment we
have begins toward the end of the ninth fit, and versifies Judith 12:10 to
16:1. We cannot tell whether the poet stopped here or composed a thirteenth
fit, answering to the canticle of thanksgiving in Judith, 16. If such a fit 13
ever existed, it has been lost.
The tenth fit (15121) deals with the feast at which Holofernes became drunk and
with his death at the hands of Judith. The eleventh fit (122235)deals with the
return of Judith and her maid to Bethulia, bringing the head of Holofernes; the
joyous welcome Judith got from the Hebrews; her speech exhorting them to go
forth to battle; and their attack upon the Assyrian host. The twelfth fit (236350)
deals with the hesitation of the Assyrians, though under attack, to wake Holofernes;
their terror and flight when at last one of them ventured into the generals tent and
found his headless body; the slaughter the Hebrews made and the booty they took;
finally the spoils awarded to Judith and the praise she gave to God.
The poem belongs to the last stage of the run-on style (see above, p. 27).
Its author shows himself a master of his medium. Indeed, he has produced
a tour de force. In spite of the many swollen lines (nearly a fifth of the
13
This codex, better known as the Beowulf MS, is now available in facsimile: Early English MSS in
Facsimile XII (Copenhagen, 1963), ed. K.Malone.
Judith
68
Christ
and Satan
whole), the long periods, the frequent variations and descriptive details, we
find the tempo swift, the action sharp and straightforward. An elaborate and
sophisticated style, made for epic breadth and leisure, is here seized upon and
forced to yield effects akin to those of the scops, though without that singing
quality which the gleemans older and simpler art had kept. The heroic tone
of Judith goes without saying. The battle scenes have rightly been praised,
but owe less to the poet than to tradition. The scene of drunken revelry (15
ff.), however, stands unmatched in Old English. The poet has not hesitated to
depart from his source when his art is served thereby. His fondness for rime is
worthy of note. We take him to have been an Angle (Mercian) of the tenth
century, though Saxon authorship is possible.
The second book of the Junius MS is given over to some 733 lines of verse,
a poem which Grein aptly called Christ and Satan; it has no name in the MS.
The text is divided into 12 fits. The first of these begins with a brief account of
Creation (attributed to the Son) and the fall of the angels (133); then come a
lament by Satan (3450), a reproachful reply by his crew (5164), and a homiletic
passage (6574). Satans second lament makes the second fit (75125). The third
fit gives us two more laments of Satan: the third (126159) and the fourth (160
189). The fourth fit is a short homily inspired by the fate of the fallen angels (190
224). With the next fit (225255) Satan begins a fifth lament, which he finishes
in the first part (256279) of the sixth fit. The rest of this fit (280315) and the
whole of the seventh (316365) make a kind of homily on the sorrows of hell
and the joys of heaven. The eighth fit repeats in rsum the story of the fall of the
angels (366379a) and begins the story of Christs harrowing of hell (379b442).
This story is finished in the ninth fit (443469), which ends with Christs speech
to the souls he has rescued from hell and taken up to heaven (470513); in this
speech Christ tells of the creation and fall of man, of his resolve to save man, and
of his incarnation and earthly life. The tenth fit is devoted to the Resurrection
(514557). The eleventh fit tells of the Ascension, Pentecost, the fate of Judas,
and Christs kingdom in heaven, to which men too may come (558597). The
twelfth fit goes on to Doomsday (598643), gives yet another reminder of the
joys of the saved (644664), and adds an account of Christs temptation in the
wilderness (665710); the fit ends with Satans return to hell and to the curses of
his followers after his failure to tempt Christ (711733).
This poem makes many problems which cannot be taken up here.14 Apart
from the faulty transmission of the text, we must reckon with a scheme of
presentation anything but straightforward. The sequence, chronological in
the main, does great violence to chronology on occasions. Thus, the
temptation of Christ comes at the end of the poem, and the fall of man is
not spoken of until long after the event (410421 and 481488). In telling
the story of Christ from Creation to Doomsday, the poet plays action down
and situation up. His interest lies, not in the narrative but in the punishments
and rewards of the life to come, and he pictures these over and over, using
14
See the discussions in the editions of Clubb and Gollancz cited above (p. 61).
69
all the devices at his command, and constantly hammering home the moral:
we should follow Christ, not Satan. The laments put in Satans own mouth
make clear in dramatic fashion the folly of choosing such leadership as his.
The Satan of this poem is not the defiant and indomitable leader of Genesis
B, but a leader broken by defeat, who must swallow the curses of his own
dright. The fate of Satan and his crew serves as the supreme object-lesson by
which mankind may take warning. On the positive side, Christs rejection of
Satans lordship in the temptation scene serves as the supreme example which
all men should follow when faced with the temptations of earthly life. This
scene therefore makes a fitting end for the poem, and we cannot accept the
view of Gollancz that the poet after finishing his poem tacked the temptation
on by way of afterthought. No immediate sources have been found for this
remarkable work. The author drew on Christian tradition, as known to him
from the Bible and elsewhere. He handled his material with a freedom which
suggests that he wrote without having any books before him; he seems to
have relied on his memory of the events and to have given rein to his fancy.
His verses have power and vividness, but too much should not be made of
their originality: the poet combines lyric, dramatic, and epic in typical Old
English fashion. We reckon the poem Anglian in origin, and of the ninth
century, but we do not set even so loose a date as this with confidence. We
agree with all recent authorities that Cdmon did not compose Christ and
Satan. The clerk who made the poem belonged to Cdmons school, but
learned from another school as well: that of Cynewulf. The work of this
school will be considered in the next chapter.
VII
Religious Poetry: Cynewulf and His School
The Fates
of the
Apostles
Nearly all Old English poetry is anonymous. One poet, however, had a habit
of signing his verses, and from these signatures we know his name: Cynewulf.1
His motive was not vainglory but (as he himself explains) hope that those
who liked his poems would name him in their prayers. The signatures took
the form of runes, woven in the verses towards the end but not at the very
end of a given poem. From them we learn that the poet spelt his name
indifferently Cynewulf and Cynwulf. Since he did not use the spelling Cyniwulf
we infer that he lived after weak medial i had become e. The date of this
sound-shift varies with the dialect. Other linguistic evidence, however, marks
Cynewulf an Angle, and only the Northumbrian and Mercian dialects need
be considered. Northumbrian weak i was kept until the middle of the ninth
century, while Mercian variants with e appear early in that century, and this
e may go back to the last years of the eighth. The earliest possible time for
Cynewulf, then, is the last quarter of the eighth century, and the ninth makes
a safer date. Of the man we know nothing except what we glean from his
work. We have four poems of his: a list, a sermon, and two legends (i.e.,
saints lives). We take them in the order given.
The Fates of the Apostles is a poem of 122 lines, recorded in the Vercelli
Book2 (late tenth century). It falls into two parts: the list proper, in which
are named the places or countries where the twelve apostles taught and
died (187); and the poets signature with accompanying verses (88122).
Unlike the Menologium, our poem does not include the feast-days of the
twelve, but we need not infer with Krapp (p. xxxii) that the motive which
inspired its composition was, therefore, purely literary and devotional. A
certain learned, antiquarian spirit also enters in, and such a list, though
without dates, obviously had practical (didactic) worth besides. No single
source answers precisely to lines 187, and such a source will hardly be
found: Cynewulf starts by telling us he gleaned far and wide how the
apostles made their virtue known, and one naturally infers that the poet
made a compilation drawn from various sources. Name-forms like Petrus
1
See S.K.Das, Cynewulf and the Cynewulf Canon (Calcutta, 1942); K.Jansen, Die CynewulfForschung (Bonn, 1908); K.Sisam, Cynewulf and his Poetry, Proc. Brit. Acad., XVIII (1932). 303
331. The texts are edited by A.S.Cook, The Christ of Cynewulf (Boston, 1900), and The OE
Elene(New Haven, 1919); W.Strunk, The Juliana of Cynewulf (Boston, 1904); G.P.Krapp, Andreas
and the Fates of the Apostles (Boston, 1906). On the so-called Christ see especially Brother Aug.
Philip, PMLA, LV (1940). 903909.
2
Facsimile edition by Max Frster (Rome, 1913); printed verse texts in Krapp-Dobbie, II.
70
RELIGIOUS POETRY: CYNEWULF AND HIS SCHOOL
71
and Paulus point to Latin sources, and like lists in Latin have been pointed
out by Krapp and by Sisam. The poem has a so-called epic opening consonant
with the worth of the theme. The following passage is representative:
Certain ones in Rome,
bold ones and brave, gave up their lives
through Neros cruel cunning,
Peter and Paul; that apostleship
is widely honored among the nations, (lines 1115)
The personal part of the poem (88122) makes more than a fourth of the whole.
The disproportion springs from the authors eagerness to win the prayers of
others, an eagerness which drives him to repeat, after the runic passage, the
request for prayers which he had already made before that passage. Art here
yields to souls need! Otherwise the poem is marked by good craftsmanship.
The riming half-line nearwe searwe (13b) is worthy of note.
The Ascension (otherwise known as Christ B) is a poem of 427 lines.
recorded in the Exeter Book. The poem is divided into five fits. These we
analyze as follows:
I. Exhortation to an illustrious man (the poets patron?) to make every effort
to understand why the angels at the nativity did not appear in white robes (1
10a); the contrast here between nativity and ascension (10b19a); the throng
[before the ascension] in Bethany (19b34); Christs farewell to his followers
(3551); the ascension and the song of the angels (5266); the two angels appear
to the disciples and explain the event (6777).
II. The parting words of the angels to the disciples (7887); Christ assumes his
seat in heaven amid rejoicing on high (8893); the disciples return to Jerusalem
and await Pentecost as Christ had bidden before he ascended (94107); whiterobed angels (i.e. splendor) befit Christs return to his throne above (108118);
song of angels, celebrating Christs harrowing of hell and return to heaven with
the redeemed souls (119146); lyric passage (with rime) on the plan of salvation
and mans need to choose between good and evil (147160).
III. Man should thank God for his gifts, the greatest of which is the hope of
salvation, held out at the ascension (161187); Christs earthly life, from nativity
to ascension, made our salvation possible (188193); of this Job sang, using the
figure of a bird [Job 28:7], but the Jews could not understand (194219); Christ
divides gifts among men; no one gets all spiritual wisdom, for fear of pride
harming him (220246).
IV. God by gifts honors his creatures, whose worth reflects God himself, our sun
(247258); the Church is likened to the moon; after the ascension she shone
forth over the earth (259264a); through the gift of the Holy Ghost [at Pentecost]
the Church was enabled to withstand the persecutions which began after the
ascension (264b272); the six leaps of Christ (conception, nativity, crucifixion,
burial, descent into hell, ascent into heaven), referred to by Solomon [Song 2:8]
(273304); so ought we to leap from strength to strength until we reach heaven
through holy works; to that end we must choose the good and reject the evil;
Ascension
72
God will help us against devils; we must keep watch all our lives and pray to
God, our benefactor, to whom be praise and glory for ever (305339).
V. If God helps us, we need not fear devils (340343a); Doomsday is near, when
we shall be judged by our deeds (343b346a); Christs first coming was in
humility [the angels did not appear in white robes]; his second coming will be in
judicial sternness, and many will be punished (346b357); runic passage (the
poets signature) on Doomsday (358368a); the destruction of the world by fire
(368b375); be mindful of the souls need now, before it is too late (376384);
the terrors of Doomsday (385410); life is like a voyage, and heaven is like a
port made ready for us by Christ when he ascended (411427).
Juliana
In this poem Cynewulf versified the conclusion of Gregory the Greats sermon
on the ascension (the 29th of his gospel homilies).3 Lines 220246 owe much
to another source, presumably an English poem not unlike the extant Gifts
of Men (see below, p. 83). The Bible and other works seem to have been used
more or less besides. The poet treated his matter with freedom and artistic
skill, though of course his thought is derivative and traditional enough. This
versified sermon must be reckoned successful. In structure it is governed by
its chief source.
Juliana is a poem of the Exeter Book. It comes to 731 lines as we have it,
but through loss of MS leaves two passages are wanting: one before folio 70
(between lines 288 and 289), the other before folio 74 (between lines 558
and 559). The poem is made up of seven fits. These may be outlined as follows:
I. Under the Roman emperor Maximian (A.D. 305311), persecutor of the
Christians, there lived in Nicomedia a pagan official named Heliseus [Eleusius],
who fell in love with the young and beautiful Christian virgin Juliana; she wished
to keep her virginity, but her pagan father Africanus betrothed her to Heliseus;
she refused to marry him unless he turned Christian; he protested to her father,
who expostulated with her (1104).
II. Juliana replied, holding her ground; Africanus argued further with her but
could not move her; he turned her over to Heliseus for judgment; her betrothed,
after pleading with her in vain, had her stripped and scourged; he then urged
apostasy upon her with threats; she defied him and his false gods (105224).
III. Heliseus had Juliana hanged on a tree by the hair and beaten for six hours;
he then threw her into prison; a devil visited her there in angel form, to persuade
her to yield; at her prayer a voice from heaven revealed the tempters identity
and gave orders that she seize the fiend and not let him go until he had confessed
all; she obeyed and thereby forced the wretch to reveal the secrets of deviltry
(225344).
IV. The fiend continues his confessions (345453).
V. He concludes; at his entreaty Juliana lets him go back to hell (454558).
VI. An angel saved Juliana from the fire into which her persecutor had thrown
3
For the Latin text see Migne, Patrologia Latina, LXXVI. 1218.
73
her; she was then put into a vat of boiling lead but took no hurt; 75 pagans were
killed by the lead as it splashed; the judge then ordered that her head be cut off
(559606).
VII. Julianas martyrdom; her persecutors death by drowning; Julianas burial
and the honors paid to her then and now; personal ending, with runic signature
and plea for prayers in the poets usual style (607731).
It is worthy of note that beheading (i.e., a normal form of execution) killed

the saint, whereas the various (unhistorical) tortures left her unharmed. The
poet had for source a Latin prose life of St. Juliana not substantially different
from that printed in the Bollandist Acta Sanctorum under the martyrs feastday, February 16. He followed his source in the main, but left out certain
objectionable features of the ladys conduct, and used phraseology drawn
from English heroic tradition. His departures from his source show a critical
eye; his own verses, a practised hand. Juliana is not prentice work, as some
scholars seem inclined to think. In particular, we do not blame the poet for
keeping the miraculous instruction by which his heroine holds the devil fast
in her clutches, grotesque though the scene to the modern reader. The poems
weakness lies elsewhere: it is hack work, verse done to order (or so we make
bold to conjecture).
The author did better with the legend of St. Helen (mother of Constantine)
and the true Cross. Elene is a poem of the Vercelli Book. It comes to 1321
lines. The MS text is marked for division into 15 fits. We summarize these as
follows:
III. Constantine wins a battle by the sign of the cross, revealed to him in a
dream, and becomes a Christian (1193).
III. He learns Christian lore, especially the story of Calvary, and sends his mother
Elene to seek the burial-place of the cross on which Christ died. Elene makes her
way to Jerusalem by sea and land (194275).
IVVIII. Elene and the jews; by keeping one of them, Judas, in a pit, without
food, she finally makes him agree to help find the burial-place (276708).
IX. Judas is led to Calvary but, not knowing just where the Cross is buried,
prays to God for a sign (709802).
X. God makes the sign; Judas digs in the spot indicated and finds three crosses
20 feet down; they are brought to Elene, and the true Cross is identified by
another miracle: it brings a dead man back to life (803894).
XI. War of words between Satan and Judas (895967).
XII. Constantine rejoices when messengers from Elene bring the news; he orders
a church built on the spot where the Cross was found; Elene sees to this; Judas
is baptized (9681043).
XIII. Judas is made bishop of Jerusalem; his name is changed to Cyriacus; Elene
longs for the nails by which Christ was fastened to the Cross; Judas prays to
Elene
74
God for a sign, God answers the prayer, and the nails are found; the people
rejoice and Elene thanks God (10441147).
XIV. Elene seeks advice about the nails; a wise man suggests that they be made
into a bit for Constantines horse. Elene gives treasure to Cyriacus before leaving
for Rome; she urges regular observance of the day (May 3) when the Holy Rood
was found; the poet calls down blessings upon those mindful of this festival
(11481236).
XV. In a rimed passage the poet tells of his art; in a runic passage he signs his
name; he ends with a passage on Doomsday (12371321).
This legend differs from the usual saints life in that the interest attaches to a
deed not linked with the saints death. The Latin text which lay before
Cynewulf as he wrote has not come down to us. If Carleton Brown is right,4
it was of Irish origin; certainly it differed in some details from any extant
version of the legend. The name-form Cyriacus (instead of Quiriacus) indicates
that Cynewulfs immediate source stood close to the Greek original: no
unexpected feature of an early Irish Latin text. In regular Old English fashion,
Cynewulf took much from native heroic set pieces: e.g., the admirable but
conventional descriptions of voyage and battle, heroic names and all.5 His
own contribution looms larger in the less poetical parts; he told his tale clearly
and simply, as Old English poets go. Here he doubtless owed something to
his Latin source (the suggestion is Sisams), though he was far from modeling
his style on that of Latin prose. The inventio sanctae crucis ends with line
1236, and the riming and runic passages of the last fit are commonly taken to
be autobiographical, along with the runic signatures in the other poems. Sisam
is probably right in taking 1259 f. to mean that the poet had a patron, and it
seems plausible to infer from 1237 f. that Cynewulf was old when he composed
Elene, though this age, coupled with divine inspiration (1251), reminds one
of Cdmon and may have been put in by way of imitation of Bedes familiar
story. Otherwise, we learn that the poet felt himself a sinner, in need of prayers,
when his thoughts turned to doomsday: information accurate enough, no
doubt, but too vague to help us much. The various runic passages make
formidable problems which we cannot deal with here.6
The work of Cynewulf marks a new stage in the history of English
religious poetry. This had begun with paraphrases of biblical story. It now
went on to themes more pointedly didactic. Cynewulf himself versified
exemplary deeds of saints and a sermon on the ascension. We do not know
whether he took the lead in departing from Cdmons themes, or whether
he was following someone else.7 In any case, the school which goes by his
4
ESt, XL (1909), 129. See also F.Holthausen, Zeitschrift fr deutsche Philologie, XXXVII (1905).
119, with the references there given.
5
The poets Francan, Hugas, Hregotan, and Hunas did not actually fight in the ranks of Maxentius
at the Milvian bridge, where Constantine by tradition had his vision of the cross.
6
See Sisams discussion and R.W.V.Elliott, English Studies, XXXIV (1953). 4957.
7
The author of The Dream of the Rood probably lived before Cynewulf, but this poem is a thing
apart.
75
name greatly widened the scope of vernacular verse. We have looked at

Cynewulfs own poems. We now take up the poems of others on kindred
themes.
The English hermit St. Guthlac early became the subject of a Latin life by
Felix, a monk of Croyland.8 This life served as source for an English prose
life of the saint. Two English verse lives have likewise come down to us; they
are known as Guthlac A and B,9 and are recorded together in the Exeter
Book. One passage in A (between lines 368 and 369) and the last few lines of
B have been lost by mutilation of the MS. A comes to 818 lines, divided into
eight fits; B, to 561 lines, divided into seven fits. In each poem the first fit
makes a kind of prologue. In B this prologue is devoted to the story of Adam
and Eve; Guthlac is introduced toward the end of the fit. In A the prologue
begins with the bliss of heaven, and goes on to the problem of how to attain
this bliss: some of the ways of leading ones life on earth are considered, and
finally the poem comes to the hermits way. Guthlac is not introduced until
the second fit. In both poems Guthlac is plagued by devils, but is sustained by
forces of good and dies in the odor of sanctity. Grein wrongly attached the
first 29 lines of A to the preceding poem about doomsday, which ends with a
passage on the life eternal. B seems to be based chiefly on the Latin life. It has
been attributed to Cynewulf on stylistic grounds, but since his signature is
wanting we find it safer to attribute the poem to some Anglian who belonged
to the same school. A is commonly reckoned earlier; its author owed little if
anything to Felix, but relied on oral tradition, though making use of literary
sources in giving literary form to this tradition.
Yet another legend, known to scholars as Andreas, has come down to us
in the Vercelli Book.10 Its 1722 lines of verse are divided into 15 fits. The
poem tells how St. Andrew at Gods bidding rescued St. Matthew from the
cannibal Mermedonians, and, after suffering much at their hands through
the machinations of Satan, called forth upon them a miraculous flood which
made them see the error of their ways. When they had taken for theirs the
true faith, Andrew left them, but God bade him turn back and stay with the
converts a week longer. He then went away for good, to their great grief.
The poem ends with a choral song in praise of God, put in the mouths of
the erstwhile cannibals. The poet had for source a Latin version (of which
two fragments survive) of the Greek apocryphal Acts of Andrew and
Matthew. He treats his source with a freedom for which he apologizes in a
well-known passage (14781489a): his paraphrase is selective rather than
inclusive. The verses make lively reading. They may lack polish, but they
have vigor to spare. Like most Old English religious poets, the author leans
8
Text printed by P.Gonser, Anglistische Forschungen, XXVII (1909).

Good texts will be found in editions of the Exeter Book. For a discussion, see G.H. Gerould,
MLN, XXXII (1917). 7789.
10
Ed. G.P.Krapp, Andreas and the Fates of the Apostles (Boston, 1906). A prose life of St. Andrew
also existed, ed. J.W.Bright, in his Anglo-Saxon Reader (4ed., 1917), pp. 113128. For the Latin sourcematerial, see F.Blatt, Die lateinischen Bearbeitungen der Acta Andreae el Matthiae (Giessen, 1930).
9
Guthlac
Andreas
76
hard on heroic tradition for the phraseology of poetic elaboration, and for
purple passages in general. The epic opening,
What! we have learned of the twelve under the stars
in days of yore, heroes rich in glory,
thanes of the Lord. Their might did not fail
in warfaring, when banners clashed,
after they scattered as the Lord himself,
high king of the heavens, had set their portion.
Those were famous men the earth over,
brave folk-leaders and bold in fight,
doughty warriors, when shield and hand
on the field of battle defended helmet,
Phoenix
is not unlike that of Beowulf, though it would be wrong to presume borrowing:

both poets drew from a common stock of heroic formulas. The military
metaphor need not disturb us more here than in Onward Christian Soldiers,
or Eph. 6:1017.
From legend we go to fable. Mediterranean (originally Eastern) lore about
beasts and birds early made its way to England, where the poets, like their
sources, put it to allegorical and didactic use. Phoenix is the most notable
composition of this kind in Old English. The poem is recorded in the Exeter
Book. It has 677 lines, divided into eight fits.11
The first fit pictures an earthly paradise in the east. The second describes the life
of a fabulous bird, the phoenix, in this paradise, and tells of its flight to Syria,
every 1000 years, to renew its youth. The process of renewal (by fire) is explained
in the third fit. In the fourth we get a description of the new bird, risen from the
old birds ashes; then comes an account of the departure of the phoenix for its
old home. With the fifth fit the bird returns to its paradise, and the author
begins (381) an allegorical treatment of the fable: the phoenix is likened (I) to
the elect of Adams seed, and (2) to Christ. This comparison, together with
pertinent digressions (such as the story of Adam and Eve), takes up the rest of
the poem to lines 661b666, which make a conventional ending in praise of
God (compare Andreas 17181722) but are followed by a second ending, in
macaronic verse, on the rewards of the good in the life to come.
Lines 1380 are based on the De Ave Phoenice of Lactantius (fl. c. 300). 12 The
allegorical comparisons, etc., were drawn from various learned sources; in part,
from the authors fancy. The verse, though rising to no heights, is competently
done and makes pleasant reading. The poet was evidently a clerk and presumably
an Angle; he lived in Cynewulfs day or thereabouts. Earlier scholars had more
precise views, but the old datings go beyond our scanty evidence. As Sisam
remarks in another connection,13
11
Ed. A.S.Cook, Elene, Phoenix and Physiologus (New Haven, 1919). For the eleventh-century
Phoenix, see F.Kluge, ESt, VIII (1885). 474479, and Cook, ed. cit., pp. 128131.
12
O.F.Emerson compares the Latin and English poems in RES, II (1926). 1831.
13
Proc. Brit. Acad., XVIII (1932). 307. See also R.Imelmann, Forschungen zur ae. Poesie (1920),
p. 239.
77
Elaborate linguistic and metrical tests have been applied to establish the
chronological order of Old English poems. Because these tests leave out of account
differences of authorship, of locality, of subject, and of textual tradition, the
detailed results, whether of relative order or of absolute date, are little better
than guess-work hampered by statistics.
Unnatural natural history is further represented by a poem called Bestiary or

Physiologus,14 recorded in the Exeter Book. The name, which does not appear
in the MS, is that of the poets source. The poem, 179 lines long, falls into
three fits, but most of the third fit is wanting, through loss of a MS leaf at
some stage in the transmission of the text. The three fits are devoted
respectively to panther, whale, and partridge; these have been thought to
stand for the creatures of land, sea, and air. In the first fit (174), after an
introductory passage on the lower animals in general, the panthers looks
and ways are described and given allegorical interpretation: the beast itself is
likened to Christ; its foe the dragon, to Satan. The whale (75163) does not
get so good a character; it is credited with passing for an island to entice
unwary sailors, who land only to drown when the creature dives. Another
trick of the whales when hungry is to send forth a sweet scent from its open
mouth, thereby luring its prey into its very jaws, which it then shuts upon
them. In the allegory the whale stands for the devil and his crew of tempters;
the whales mouth for hell. The poets treatment of the partridge (164179)
cannot be made out from the text as it stands, because of the loss of so many
lines. The verses end with a passage (175179) which seems to be of general
application, like the introductory passage (18a) already mentioned. We thus
have reason to think the poem complete, except for the lacuna in the third fit.
The author presumably did not try to paraphrase the whole of his source, but
restricted himself to three of the creatures considered in the pseudo-scientific
book from which he drew. His poem might well have been written by the
author of Phoenix. Whether it was or not, it belongs to the same period and
reflects a like taste. In later times we find fuller and more elaborate treatment
of unnatural natural history; see below, p. 161.
14
Ed. A.S.Cook, ed. cit.
The
Bestiary
VIII
Religious Poetry: Poems on Various Themes
Dream
of the
Rood
Old English religious poetry was not confined to biblical paraphrase, homily,
legend, and allegory. Many other types are found. We take up first the dream
or vision, exemplified in the Dream of the Rood (i.e., dream about the Cross),
a 156line poem of the Vercelli Book. Fragments of an older version have
come down to us as a runic inscription on the great stone cross at Ruthwell in
Dumfriesshire, Scotland. In the following, the two versions will be called R
(Ruthwell) and V (Vercelli). The most recent editors of the Rood1 date R
early in the eighth, V late in the ninth century.2 In any case, R belongs to the
classical period of Old English poetry. Unluckily, little of it is left, and all
editions of the Rood have been based on V. The poem is in the first person
throughout.
It falls into three parts: the opening words of the dreamer (127), the words spoken
by the Rood (28121), and the words of the dreamer after the dream is over (122
156). The speaker begins with his dream, in which he saw the True Cross and it
spoke to him, telling him its history from the time when it was a tree growing in
the woods to the time when, centuries after it bore Christ on Calvary, it was found
[by St. Helen, who is not named] and made an object of worship (2894). The
Rood goes on to urge the dreamer to promote its cult (95121); here the practical
point and purpose of the dream comes out. With the Roods speech the dream
presumably ends, though the dreamers waking is passed over. The dreamer now
explains how his dream about the Rood has changed his life; ever since, he has
devoted himself to the cult of the True Cross, and hopes to win a heavenly home
thereby. The poem ends with a short passage about Christ (144b156): may the
Lord be a friend to me, he who. In this passage Christs passion, death,
harrowing of hell, and ascension are touched upon. This ending takes the place
of the lines in praise of God with which so many devotional poems end.
The Rood is one of the glories of Old English literature; indeed, of English
literature as a whole. The introductory words of the dreamer could hardly be
bettered, and the story of the Cross on Calvary has overwhelming poetic
power and beauty. We quote a few lines:3
1
B.Dickins and A.S.C.Ross (1934). For further references, see the bibliography in their edition.
See also the monograph of H.Btow, Das ae. Traumgesicht vom Kreuz (Heidelberg, 1935).
2
If the southern coast of Strathclyde continued to be held by the English after the Battle of
Nechtansmere (685), an English inscription might well have been cut at Ruthwell as late as the eighth
century. C.L.Wrenn, in Trans. Philological Soc. for 1943, pp. 1922, dates R at the end of the eighth
century.
3
Taken, by permission, from K.Malone, Ten Old English Poems (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press,
1941).
78
RELIGIOUS POETRY: POEMS ON VARIOUS THEMES
79
It was many years agoI remember it still

that I was felled, afar, at the forest edge,
borne off from my roots. Evil men took me;
When I saw the ends of the earth shaking
I dared not bow or break, against
the word of God. All at once I might
have struck his foes down, but I stood fast there.
I quaked when he clasped me, but I could not bow to earth,
nor fall to the ground; it was my fate to stand.
As a rood I was raised; I bore my Ruler up,
the King of the skies; I could not bow down.
They pierced me with dark nails; the places are on me still,
the wicked wounds are open. Not one of them dared I harm.
They railed at us both. I was all running with blood,
as he gave up the ghost, with gore from his side.
A heavy burden I bore on that hill,
My lot was hard. (lines 2830, 3538, 4251)
Modern readers like the first 77 lines best, but the poem makes an organic
whole, and the later passages on the cult of the Rood were essential to the
poets purpose. The final passage begins in the middle of a line, but otherwise
the poem belongs to the early stage of the run-on style. Its author was a
Northumbrian, as the dialect of R reveals. The story of Cdmon may have
inspired him to choose the vision form. If, as Dickins and Ross suggest (p.
19), the occasion for the revision of the poem was the gift of a piece of the
True Cross to Alfred in 885, we may owe version V to a West Saxon reviser.
We cannot be sure of this, however; we cannot be sure, indeed, that V
represents any substantial revision or expansion of R. No definite source of
the poem has been found, though various influences have been pointed out,4
and it seems likely that the Rood, in both conception and execution, belongs
to the short list of original Old English religious poems.
The poems which we shall next consider are not readily classified except
by subject. First we take The Advent (or Nativity; also known as Christ
A). a poem recorded in the Exeter Book.5 Its beginning is lost; what we
have left comes to 439 lines, divided into five fits. The last of these fits is
devoted, in part, to praise of the Trinity, but the rest of the poem is given
over to the theme of Advent: that season of the Christian year so named,
not the nativity proper. The season is marked by joyful expectancy, and the
poet has caught this expectant mood. The note of wonder, too, is sounded
again and again. Much of the text is best described as hymn-like. Hortatory
and expository passages also occur, as well as two dialogues: one between
Mary and dwellers in Jerusalem, the other between Mary and Joseph. The
latter opens in a way reminiscent of secular heroic poetry, but this poem owes
4
See especially M.Schlauch, Essays and Studies in Honor of Carleton Brown (1940), pp. 2334.
Ed. A.S.Cook, The Christ of Cynewulf (Boston, 1900). A more accurate text is that of KrappDobbie. III.
5
Advent
80
Harrowing
of Hell
less than most to the tradition of the scops; in style it marks a stage at which
religious verse had reached maturity and independence. The poem is based,
in large part, on antiphons of the Breviary. The dialogue between Joseph and
Mary on the Conception goes back, ultimately, to Matt. 2:1825; its immediate
source has not been found. The poet is sometimes too medieval for the modern
stomach, as when he likens Mary to a door, the key to which God alone
holds and uses, but most of the poem makes good reading still. The anonymous
author in all likelihood was an Angle of the ninth century. The ascription of
this poem to Cynewulf rests on no evidence worthy of the name.
The Harrowing of Hell is a poem of the Exeter Book.6 It comes to 137
lines, though a hole in the MS has done some damage to the text. The poem
opens with the visit of the Marys to Christs tomb on Easter morning, but
soon (23b) shifts to hell, where John the Baptist serves as spokesman for the
souls held there until the harrowing. John makes a short speech (2632)
before the harrowing; he predicts the coming of Christ. After the harrowing
has begun, we are told who await release:
Adam and Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,
many a bold leader, Moses and David,
Isaiah and Zachariah,
many patriarchs and a throng of heroes too,
the company of prophets, a host of women,
many virgins, a countless multitude of folk, (lines 4449)
Doomsday
Poems
When John sees Christ enter he makes a second speech. This falls into two
parts: first, words of thanks to Christ, followed by apostrophes to Gabriel,
Mary, Jerusalem, and Jordan (59106); secondly, a prayer to Christ, asking
that he have mercy upon the captives in hell and that he baptize them (107
134). At this point a scribe seems to have skipped an uncertain number of
lines; the extant text continues with three lines (135137) obviously spoken,
not by John but by somebody else who is supporting Johns plea that the
captives be baptized. Here the poem breaks off. The lost conclusion
presumably told of the baptism of the captives and their triumphant translation
to heaven. Lines 1233 are based on the biblical account of the resurrection.
The rest of the poem goes back to the second part of the apocryphal gospel of
Nicodemus, but this can hardly be called a source in any strict sense, as our
text differs markedly from it in detail. The poem is anonymous and the date
of its composition is uncertain.
Three poems on Doomsday have come down to us from Old English
times. We distinguish them as A, B, C.7 The first, Doomsday A, is recorded
in the eleventh-century MS 201, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. The
6
Dissertations: J.H.Kirkland (1885), J.Cramer (1896); the latters also published as an article in
Anglia, XIX (1897). 137174. Text in Cramer; also in editions of Exeter Book.
7
See G.Grau, [Morsbachs] Studien zur englischen Philologie, XXXI (1908). Editions: A, Hans
Lhe, Be Domes Dge (Bonner Beitrge, XXII, 1907); B, not separately edited, but included in editions
of the Exeter Book; C, not separately edited, but included in A.S.Cook, The Christ of Cynewulf (Boston,
1900).
81
poet for the most part follows closely his Latin original, a poem De Die
Judicii attributed to Bede. The greater length of the English version (308 lines
for the 157 of the Latin) reflects in a few passages some expansion of the
source but more commonly a mere effort to reproduce in full the thoughts
there expressed. The English version seems to have been done in the tenth
century. Its author used standard West Saxon speech, though a few Anglian
forms occur. We cannot name or plausibly localize the poet, but can say that
he made an effective English version of the Latin poem. Doomsday B is a
poem of 119 lines, recorded in the Exeter Book. The scribe marked two fits,
lines 180 making the first, lines 81119 the second. The anonymous author
drew on Christian tradition, as handed down in Latin poems, prose treatises,
etc.8 His verses show good workmanship, for the most part, but no great
poetic gift. They were hardly composed earlier than the ninth century, and
later composition is possible enough. Doomsday C (also known as Christ C)
is likewise a poem of the Exeter Book. It makes a text 798 lines long, and
divided into seven fits. Various connections and parallels have been pointed
out;9 as a whole, C, like B, rests on Christian tradition, not on a single source.
The poet takes up the resurrection of the dead, their assembly for judgment,
the destruction of the world, the second coming of Christ, the separation of
the souls into two groups (sheep and goats), the words of Christ to each
group, the punishments of hell and the rewards of heaven, together with
much homiletic matter and many details which need not be listed here. In
developing his theme the poet does not follow a rigorous order, and the poem
gives us a combination, familiar in Old English, of narrative, description,
reflection, exhortation and rhapsody. The verses show a practised and skilful
hand; they include eloquent and beautiful passages, but nothing that deserves
the name great. Swollen verses appear not infrequently. We know nothing of
the poems authorship; the old attribution to Cynewulf lacks evidential basis.
The time of composition cannot be set with precision, but the poem is neither
early nor late.
Closely linked in theme to the Doomsday poems is Soul and Body, a
poem in which wicked and righteous souls speak to their respective (dead)
bodies.10 The poem falls naturally into two fits: in the first (lines 1129) the
wicked soul speaks; in the second (130169), the righteous. The first fit has
come down to us in two MSS: Vercelli and Exeter. The two texts differ
more or less in wording and even in number of lines. V comes to 126 lines,
E to 121; putting them together, we reach our total of 129. The second fit
appears in Vercelli only, where through loss of one or more MS leaves it
breaks off in the middle of a sentence. The poem begins with a prologue
8
For an attempt to specify the sources more narrowly see Grau, pp. 176180. The homiletic tone
of the poem is worthy of note.
9
See Cook, ed., pp. 170225 and Grau, pp. 4883. See also R.Willard, PMLA, XLII (1927). 314
330.
10
Ed. Wlker, II. 92107. A recent discussion of the body and soul theme is that of E.K. Heningham,
An Early Latin Debate of the Body and Soul (1939). The same author discusses the relationship between
the Old English poem and the Middle English material in PMLA, LV (1940). 291307.
Soul and
Body
82
Solomon
and
saturn
of eight lines about soul and body in general. Then we are told (914) of the
approach of the wicked soul: the poet thus sets the scene for the action of the
first fit, though he confuses matters somewhat by explaining here (instead of
in the prologue) that a soul must visit its dead body weekly for 300 years.
Lines 1516 announce the wicked soul as speaker, and the speech itself takes
up lines 17103. In the speech the soul reproaches its body for the damnation
which will be its lot on Doomsday. In lines 104109 we are told of the souls
return to hell uncomforted: the body cannot speak, or help the soul in any
way, now that it is dead; the souls reproaches have come too late. Next we
learn in detail (110127a) what happens to a dead body, and the fit ends with
two generalizations: the body is destined to be food for worms, and every wise
man is mindful of that. The second fit of course has no prologue. It begins
with the approach of the righteous soul (130134). The souls of the righteous
are then announced as speakers (135137) and the beginning of their speech
follows (138169): they give the body as much praise as the wicked soul gave
it blame. Unluckily the rest of the speech (and poem) is lost. In spite of
inconsistencies and rough spots (some of which may safely be attributed to
faulty transmission) the poet does what he set out to do: he brings home with
power the lesson that life on earth, vain in itself, has the grim function of
determining our lot in the life to come. We do not know where, when, or by
whom the poem was made. Its theme is one old and familiar in medieval
literature, though the righteous soul rarely figures in such compositions.11
In Middle English the soul and body theme also occurs in dialogue form:
the soul blames the body and the body replies in kind (see below, p. 162).
The dialogue, a literary genre handed down from antiquity, was much used
in Old and Middle English alike for didactic purposes. We take up here the
two Old English metrical dialogues between Solomon and Saturn.12 Both
are recorded in the tenth-century MS 422, CCCC, pp. 16 (first poem) and
1326 (second poem). The first 93 lines of the first poem are also recorded,
in a hand of c. 1100, on the margins of pp. 196198 of MS 41, CCCC.
Through loss of leaves and other damage the text of MS 422 is markedly
defective; that of MS 41 is late, fragmentary, and poor. The poems come
to 169 and 336 lines respectively, as we have them, but the first poem
may be incomplete, while four serious lacunae mar the second poem. The
poems seem to have different authors. The first poem may well have been
composed somewhat later than the second; both probably belong to the
ninth century, though the tenth remains a possibility. The scanty evidence
indicates that the authors were Angles. The first poem, though a dialogue
in form, comes close to being a monologue in fact; Solomon does nearly all
11
Two late and fragmentary versions (at Worcester and Oxford respectively) of an address of soul
to body have been edited by R.Buchholz, in Erlanger Beitrge, VI (1890). The Oxford fragment of 25
lines is better known under the title The Grave. For a different interpretation of the Oxford fragment,
see L.Dudley, MP, XI (1914). 429442.
12
Ed. R.J.Menner, The Poetical Dialogues of Solomon and Saturn (MLA Monograph, XIII, 1941).
By way of appendix Menner also prints a fragment of a prose dialogue. See also K.Sisam, MA, XIII
(1944). 2836.
83
the talking. His subject is the Lords Prayer, the virtues of which, as a whole
and letter by letter (or rune by rune), he explains in detail, with much use of
highly figurative speech. These virtues are magical: the author evidently
conceived of the Latin text of this prayer as a kind of spell. His poem has
little artistic worth. The author of the second poem moved on a higher level.
He made a true dialogue, in which Saturn and Solomon discuss matters of
weight. Saturn personifies heathen wisdom (eastern and northern alike);
Solomon, Christian (and Jewish) wisdom. Their dialogue is a contest, won,
of course, by the representative of Christianity. The whole makes a worthy
example of reflective religious poetry. Witness the following passage:
A little while the leaves are green;
then, afterwards, they fade, they fall to earth,
and rot away; they turn to dust, (lines 1368)
The immediate Latin sources on which the authors drew have not come
down to us. These sources belonged to Oriental rather than to Roman
Christian tradition, it would seem, and Irish transmission has been
suggested.13
We go on to eleven somewhat shorter didactic or reflective poems, more
or less religious in tone or inspiration. The compiler of the Exeter Book
included in his poetic miscellany a number of such poems. Five of them make
a sequence in the MS: Wanderer (115 lines), Gifts of Men (113), A Fathers
Teachings (94), Seafarer (124), and Overmood (84). Another sequence
consists of three gnomic poems (already considered; see above, p. 43), and
Fates of Men (98 lines), Wonders of Creation (102) and Riming Poem (87).
We include here the fragmentary Admonition as well, on the strength of lines
37, which agree strikingly with Wanderer, 1118.14 We add from the
Vercelli Book the fragment Falseness of Men (47 lines) and from MS 201,
CCCC, the exhortation to godly life commonly called Lar (80 lines).15
Of these poems, Wanderer and Riming Poem are least marked by
specific reference to God and the Faith. It would be wrong, however, to
infer that their Christianity served only for garnish. Both poets made their
central theme the vanity of worldly achievement; more particularly, the
inevitable end which awaits lord and dright. For both poets the grace of
God was the only gleam of hope in the life of men on earth. They differed,
it is true, in method of presentation. The wanderer begins in the depths;
only by retrospect does he give us glimpses of his earlier success and
happiness. The riming poet, on the contrary, starts with birth and ends with
13
Like most contests of wisdom, the dialogue includes diverse matters, such as riddles, out-of-theway lore, etc. See Menners admirable discussion, ed. cit., and his papers in JEGP, XXXVII (1938).
332354 and Studiesin Honor of F.Klaeber (Minneapolis, 1929). PP. 240253.
14
The rest of this 20-line fragment seems to be based on the Nicene Creed. We call attention,
besides, to the nine-line poem on almsgiving and the eight-line poem on the size of Pharaohs army. All
these poems may be found in editions of the Exeter Book.
15
Renamed An Exhortation to Christian Living in Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 67.
Eleven
Shorter
Poems
Wanderer
and
Riming
Poem
84
death and the grave; he traces point by point the curve, first rising, then
falling, of a distinguished earthly career,16 and he follows this scheme so strictly
that his poem has a certain stiffness, while Wanderer flows free by virtue of
its looser structure.
Riming Poem got its name from the fact that its half-lines are systematically
bound together into lines by rime as well as by alliteration. Now and then its
author, like many other Old English poets, uses rime for ornamental rather than
structural purposes. Neither the structural nor the ornamental riming helps much
in dating or localizing the poem. The events set forth are given autobiographical
form, but the poets career, though it has a courtly setting, is highly generalized:
so much so, indeed, that the speaker loses his individuality and becomes a mere
representative of mankind. Much less abstract is the art of the Wanderer poet,
who puts most of his verses in the mouth of a kemp (the wanderer) made homeless
by the death of his lord.17 Here, too, the characters are nameless and the events
happen in no particular spot and at no particular time. The wanderer may be
described as an old soldier turned sage. His dearly bought wisdom takes two
main forms: (1) gnomic sayings, and (2) reflections on the transitory nature of
all earthly things. The reflections at times amount to lamentations, but the poem
is no elegy. The following passage is characteristic:18
The tried kemp must grasp how ghastly it will be
when the weal of this world stands waste wholly,
as now in many a spot through this middle earth
the wind-blown walls stand waste, befrosted,
the abodes of men lie buried in snow,
the wine-halls are dust in the wind, the rulers
dead, stripped of glee; the dright all fell,
by the wall the proud sought shield. (lines 7380)
Seafarer
Seafarer purports to give the poets own experiences but is representative if

not indeed symbolic in meaning. The author describes vividly his hardships
at sea; he explains but vaguely why he would set out anew:
Deep goes the mood that drives my soul
to fare from home, that, far away,
I may find the stead where strangers dwell.
So, now, my soul soars from my bosom,
the mood of my mind moves with the sea-flood,
over the home of the whale, high flies and wide
to the ends of the earth; after, back to me
comes the lonely flier, lustful and greedy,
whets me to the whale-way, whelms me with his bidding
over deep waters. Dearer, then, to me
16
Compare the so-called sermon of Hrothgar in Beowulf, 17241768.

For a recent study of Wanderer see B.F.Hupp, JEGP, XLII (1943). 516538.
18
The quotations from Wanderer and Seafarer are taken, by permission, from K.Malone, Ten Old
English Poems (Baltimore, 1941).
17
85
the boons of the Lord than this life that is dead

in a land that passes; I believe no whit
that earthly weal is everlasting, (lines 3638, 5867)
Lines 6467, however, give us a hint that the speaker thought the soft life of
a landsman incompatible with heavenly bliss; in ascetic mood he chose, instead,
the hard life of a seaman.19 The call of the sea in this poem has nothing in
common with the romantic glamor of modern feeling; it is a call to suffering,
toil, privation. Only by denying oneself here can one win salvation hereafter.
Seafaring thus represents and symbolizes the sterner side of the Christian
way of life. After this autobiographical section, the poet gives us conventional
reflections about death, fame and God. Of particular interest is the
chronological primitivism implicit in lines 80 ff. Riming Poem, Wanderer,
and Seafarer are compositions of unusual poetic power and beauty. We cannot
name their authors, and we do not know just when or where these authors
lived. The other eight poems named above have less interest for the modern
reader, and we shall leave them without discussion here.
The Psalter held so important a place in Christian devotions that one
might expect to find an Old English metrical version of the whole body of
psalms. Such a version in fact once existed, but it has not come down to us
intact. Fragments of it were included in a Benedictine service-book of the
eleventh century,20 and Psalms 51 to 150 were recorded in the so-called Paris
Psalter, an eleventh-century MS which survives in a mutilated state.21 The
author of the metrical psalms22 departed widely from classical versification;
so much so, indeed, that we must take him to have been indifferent to
classical poetic tradition (or perhaps even ignorant of that tradition). His
verses may reflect a development of the popular pre-classical style as
independent of the classical movement as is the versification of the spells. In
any case, we have no right to measure these verses by classical standards and
stigmatize them as irregular. Their metrical peculiarities give us no evidence
of value in setting time or place of composition. The translation is not
without literary merit.
An independent metrical version of Psalm 50 (51) in the Kentish dialect is
recorded in the tenth-century MS Cotton Vespasian D 6. The paraphrast
begins with a prologue about David, Nathan, Uriah, and Bathsheba (125).
The psalm proper (31145) is preceded by an introduction (2630) and
followed by a conclusion (146153) announcing David as speaker of the
psalm and emphasizing his penitence. Then comes an epilogue (154157) in
the form of a prayer. The whole makes a neatly rounded work of art, something
19
For a somewhat different interpretation see O.S.Anderson, The Seafarer (Lund, 1937). See also
S.B.Liljegren, Studia Neophilologica, XIV (1942). 145159.
20
See E.Feiler, Das Benediktiner-Offizium (Heidelberg, 1901). The text of the fragments is in
Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 8086.
21
Text in Krapp-Dobbie, v. 3150.
22
Aldhelm, according to the late Eduard Sievers; see Exeter Book of Old English Poetry (1933), P.
2, n. 3. The attribution will have weight with those who accept Sievers Schallanalyse.
The Paris
Pslater
The
Kentish
Psalm
86
Paternosters
Thureth
Stanzaic
Poem
more than a translation. Another poem in the Kentish dialect, a 43-line hymn
in praise of God, is set down in the same MS.23 Both these Kentish texts are
sprinkled with West Saxon forms. Both poems are best given a tenth-century
dating.
Metrical versions of the Lords Prayer, the Gloria Patri, and the Apostles
Creed were composed in Old English. Three such versions of the Lords
Prayer have survived; we call them the Exeter, Junius, and Corpus
Paternosters, from the MSS in which they are recorded. The Exeter
Paternoster (Exeter Book) comes to II lines; the Junius (Bodleian, Junius
121), to 36 lines; the Corpus (CCCC 201), to 123 lines.24 In the longer
versions, each clause of the prayer obviously inspired a passage of verse. A
like expansion of the Latin text marks the Junius Gloria Patri of 57 lines
(Bodleian, Junius 121, and CCCC 201) and the Junius Apostles Creed of 58
lines (Junius 121).25 The three-line Cotton Gloria Patri (Cotton Titus D
XXVII) shows no expansion.26
We end our survey of Old English religious poetry with five items of
some interest for one reason or another. The Macaronic Poem (CCCC
201),27 also known as Call (or Summons) to Prayer, is 31 lines long. Its
interest for us lies in its macaronic form: each on-verse is in English, each
off-verse in Latin (but two off-verses are wanting). The Cotton Prayer of
79 lines28 is commonly divided into three, on grounds which we think insufficient. The Exeter Prayer of 118 lines,29 also called Age Mec from its
first two words, goes beyond the precative form as it proceeds and
becomes a kind of complaint; it ends, however, on a note of resignation,
expressed in words of aphoristic wisdom (quoted above, p. 26). The
mixture of genres does not keep the poem from having power and artistic
distinction. A poem hard to classify is Thureth,30 in which a halgungboc
dedication book makes an II-line speech, informing the reader that a
certain Thureth had had it made in gratitude to God and in Gods honor.
One may compare King Alfreds metrical prologue to the Pastoral Care, and
inscriptions like those on the Brussels cross (rod is min nama rood is my
name) and the Alfred Jewel (lfred mec heht gewyrcan Alfred had me
made). The Stanzaic Poem31 on fasting is of interest because it is the only
Old English poem divided into regular stanzas. It is made up of 26 eight-line
stanzas, one six-line stanza (the fourth), one nine-line stanza (the fifteenth), and
23
The two Kentish poems are in Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 8794.

Texts in Krapp-Dobbie, III. 223224 (Exeter), VI. 7778 (Junius), VI. 7074 (Corpus).
25
Texts in Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 7477 (Gloria), 7880 (Creed).
26
27
28
Cotton Julius A 2; the first 15 lines are also in Lambeth Palace Library MS 427. Text in KrappDobbie, VI. 9496.
29
Exeter Book. Text in Krapp-Dobbie, III. 215218.
30
MS Cotton Claud. A in (eleventh century). Text in Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 97; see also A.S. Napier,
Trans. Philol. Soc. for 19031906, p. 299.
31
British Museum Add. MS 43703 (Nowells sixteenth-century copy of the now fragmentary MS
Cotton Otho B XI). Text in Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 98104.
24
87
one incomplete stanza at the end, where the poem breaks off in the middle of
line 230. Each stanza makes a unit of thought and ends with a full stop. The
poem is an exhortation to the faithful to keep the fasts prescribed by the
Church, especially Ember days and Lent. It was presumably composed in the
tenth century.
IX
Secular Poetry
Durham
Poem
Ruin
The triumph of Christianity in England had literary effects which went beyond
the composition of vernacular religious poems. The new faith, and the southern
culture which came to the English with that faith, brought about great changes
in the treatment of secular themes as well, and led to the use of themes not
characteristic of the old native tradition. Such a theme is the encomium urbis
exemplified in the Durham Poem,1 a 20-line fragment in praise of the city of
Durham. The fragment as we have it belongs to the early twelfth century, in
all likelihood, but it may represent a revision of the earlier composition referred
to in line 19 of the text.2 The verses have little merit, but are worthy of
mention as the only surviving Old English example of a type of poem familiar
in classical antiquity.
A contrasting theme, which we may call de excidio urbis (or arcis), is
exemplified in Ruin,3 a poem of the Exeter Book. The poem is commonly
printed in 48 or 49 lines; we cannot be sure of the number because of the
defective state of folio 124. The loss of many words of the text makes
interpretation harder, too, of course. The poet describes the decay and
destruction of a city (or stronghold), and contrasts its present desolation
with its presumable splendor in the past. This theme has obvious kinship to
that of Wanderer, 73105, and a Latin poem of the sixth century, the De
Excidio Thoringiae of Venantius Fortunatus, begins in much the same vein.4
The Ruin poets mention of hot baths has led many to identify with Bath
the ruin described,5 but since the poem is of the nameless timeless kind we
doubt that its author had in mind one site only: the ruin which he made his
subject was (we think) a creation of his own, though in describing it he
drew on his knowledge of actual ruins. His poem departs from the usual
Old English pattern in that the reader or hearer must himself supply the
obvious moral: all earthly things perish. But possibly the lost passage at the
end was a moralizing one. We reckon the poem secular: Wyrd, not God,
1
MS: Camb. Univ. Lib. H.I. 27. Printed text and study: M.Schlauch, JEGP, XL (1941). 1428.
Line 20 in the text as printed in Krapp-Dobbie, VI. 27, where line 10 is divided into two lines.
3
See C.A.Hotchner, Wessex and Old English Poetry(1939); for criticism of this un-convincing
dissertation see Joan Blomfield, MA, IX (1940). 114116 and S.J.Herben, MLN, LIX (1944). 7274.
The text is in N.Kershaw, Anglo-Saxon and Norse Poems (Cambridge, 1922).
4
So first A.Brandl, Archiv, CXXXIX (1919). 84.
5
Identification with Hadrians Wall has been proposed by S.J.Herben; see MLN, LIV (1939). 37
39.
2
88
SECULAR POETRY
89
brought the ruin about (contrast Wanderer, 85). It does not follow, however,
that the poet was a heathen. We believe that his Wyrd answers to the Fate of
classical antiquity and that in attributing the destruction to Fate he was
conforming to some classical literary model. We do not know when or where
the poet flourished, but we do know from his poem that he had poetic power.
Of much interest are the 95 metrical riddles of the Exeter Book.6 Through
loss of leaves and other damage to the MS the text of many of these riddles is
defective. Most of the editors combine the 68th and 69th riddles, but in the
MS they are clearly distinguished. On the other hand, the 2nd and 3rd riddles
make one in the MS. The Exeter scribe recorded two versions of the 30th
riddle, while the 35th riddle survives also in a Northumbrian version elsewhere
recorded.7 The riddles vary in length from one line (No. 69) to over 100 lines
(No. 40). In general they must be reckoned literary (not popular) compositions;
they are done in the classical Old English poetic style. Two are translations of
extant Latin originals: No. 35 translates Aldhelms 33rd riddle, Lorica; No.
40, his 100th, Creatura. Several more go back, with varying degrees of
probability, to Latin riddles in the collection that goes by the name of
Symphosius.8 Many others may well have been based on specific Latin sources;
certainly the composition of Latin riddles in verse had a vogue among English
clerics in the seventh and eighth centuries, though most of these riddles have
not come down to us.9 Not a few of the Old English riddles have poetic
worth. We call attention to Lascelles Abercrombies happy modernization of
the eighth riddle.10 Other riddles give us examples of the double entente (No.
44), and one even incorporates a joke (No. 42). A certain dry humor marks
the lines on the bookworm (No. 47):
A moth ate words. To me that seemed
an odd happening, when I found it out,
that the crawling thing swallowed up the speech of a man,
a thief in darkness [ate] noble discourse
and its strong support [i.e., parchment]. The thieving guest
was none the wiser for swallowing those words.
Here (as in other cases) the riddle form was stretched to include
something merely paradoxical, and even this only by identification of
the inkmarks with the words they symbolize. Many of the riddles are in
the first person, the speaker being the solution personified. The collection was
formerly begun (as still in Tuppers edition) with the poem of 19 lines now
6
One of these, the 90th, is in Latin. Ed. F.Tupper, The Riddles of the Exeter Book (Boston, 1910);
A.J.Wyatt, Old English Riddles (Boston, 1912).
7
In Leiden Univ. MS Voss 106; ed. A.H.Smith, Three Northumbrian Poems (1933).
8
See above, p. 14.
9
See above, p. 14. For discussion of other riddles see especially MLR, XXXI (1936). 545547;
Neophilologus, IV (1919). 258262, XIII (1928). 293296, XXVI (1941). 228231, XXVII (1942).
220, XXIX (1945), 126127; XXXI (1947). 6568; Studia Neophohgica, XIV (1942), 6770; MLN,
LIV (1939). 259262; MA, XV (1946). 4854.
10
Poems (1930), p. 16.
Riddles
90
Love
Poems
known as Eadwacer. The so-called 60th riddle in all likelihood does not belong
to the collection either, but makes the first section of the poem known as
Lovers or Husbands Message. We know nothing of the authorship of the
riddles, though they were presumably composed by clerics. We give the
collection an eighth century dating, but not with certainty.
Three love poems have come down to us in the Exeter Book: the poems
Eadwacer and Lovers Message mentioned above, and a poem of 53 lines
called Wifes Lament or Complaint.11 Two of these, Eadwacer and Wifes
Lament, purport to be by women. Eadwacer is one of the most obscure poems
in the English language. We make no attempt to interpret it, but quote two
passages remarkable for their power and beauty:12
I waited for my wanderer, my Wulf, hoping and fearing:
when it was rainy weather and I sat wretched, weeping;
when the doughty man drew me into his arms
it was heaven, yes, but hateful too.
Wulf, my Wulf, waiting for thee
hath left me sick, so seldom hast thou come;
a starving mood, no stint of meat, (lines 915)
The
Wifes
Lament
The Wifes Lament likewise makes trouble for the interpreter, though here
the difficulties are far less serious.13 The poem is in the first person throughout.
The speaker is a woman who has lost her husbands favor and has been
forced, by him, to live alone, in a cheerless wooded spot. She applies several
uncomplimentary epithets to the house she lives in: herh-eard heathenish
abode, eor-scrf hole in the ground, tomb, hovel, eor-sele hut. Such
terms of denunciation need not be taken too literally. Her unhappiness finds
expression in the following passage (among others):
Fallen is this house: I am filled with yearning.
The dales are dim, the downs [i.e., hills] are high,
the bitter yards with briars are grown,
the seats are sorrowful. I am sick at heart,
he is so far from me. There are friends on earth,
lovers living that lie together,
while I, early and all alone,
walk under the oak tree, wander through these halls, (lines 2936)
She tries to console herself by reflecting that
it is the way of a young man to be woeful in mood,
hard in his hearts thought,(lines 423)
11
See R.Imelmann, Forschungen zur ae. Poesie (Berlin, 1920), pp. 1314. The author includes also
Wanderer and Seafarer in this investigation.
12
The quotations from Eadwacer and Wifes Lament are taken, by permission, from K. Malone,
13
Ed. N.Kershaw, in Anglo-Saxon and Norse Poems (Cambridge, 1922).
SECULAR POETRY
91
and by drawing a picture of such a man (her husband) himself alone and in
misery, but she finds this picture not so consoling after all, and ends with the
dismal saying,
hard is the lot
of one that longs for [ones] love in vain, (lines 523)
The lyricism of Eadwacer and the Wifes Lament, wholly secular though it
be, has little in common with the personal poetry of native tradition, the
poetry of the scops, and one is tempted to look to classical antiquity for
models. Here Virgils story of Dido comes at once to mind, while the pages of
Ovid give us other analogues.14 We cannot take these classical tales for sources,
but they may well have suggested a like literary treatment of native tales
otherwise unknown to us. Imelmann sets the years 781830 as the period
within which these poems were composed.
The Lovers Message makes other difficulties.15 The MS text falls into
four clearly marked sections: of these the first (17 lines) and the third (13
lines) are intact; the second (11 to 13 lines) and the fourth (28 or 29 lines)
are defective, because of a great hole in folio 123. The first section is usually
but (we think) wrongly taken to be a separate poem, the so-called 60th
riddle. In form, the Lovers Message is a speech, made by a stick of wood
upon which a lover had cut (presumably in runes) a message to his lady.
The stick explains how the man with his knife made it into a messenger,
and then addresses the lady directly in that capacity (line 14), with mention
of its journey to her from overseas, and with many pleas in the lovers
behalf. The ladys answer is not given, but from the tone of the speaker we
may infer that she said yes. The speech ends with a runic passage not
altogether clear. The riddle (No. 30, second version) which immediately
precedes Lovers Message in the MS likewise has a wooden object for speaker
and speeches by inanimate objects are characteristic of the riddles, as we
have seen. We remember, too, that a piece of wood (the Cross) made a
speech in Dream of the Rood. Our poet seems to have taken this device and
used it in his own way, with striking effect. His suitor gives us a foretaste,
not so much of medieval as of modern love-poetry. The go-between, the
emphasis on privacy, and the deferential tone remind one, it is true, of the
later service des dames, while the setting is courtly enough, but the man
proposes, and intends, marriage, not seduction, and he is the ladys equal,
not her servant. The plain implication that the lady can do as sne likes,
even to the point of making a journey overseas to join her lover, gives to the
poem a curiously modern touch. This touch would be removed, of course,
if we took the lovers for man and wife, but the lovers pleas would then
lose all point. The poem shows much literary merit, in spite of its mutilation.
14
See Imelmann, pp. 188307, and H.Reuschel, Paul u.Braunes Beitrge zur Geschichte der
deutschen Sprache u. Lit., LXII (1938). 132142.
15
Also known as the Husbands Message. Ed. N.Kershaw, in Anglo-Saxon and Norse Poems
(Cambridge, 1922).
The
Lovers
Message
92
Beowulf
It was composed not later than c. 950. We know nothing of its author or of
his sources.
A different kind of plea is that made by the scribe who copied the last part
of the text of the Old English translation of Bedes History recorded in CCCC
41, a MS commonly dated c. 1030. At the end of this text the copyist added
a 10-line poem of his own, a plea to readers of rank, urging his claims to
patronage.16 This versified advertisement for patrons he made as conspicuous
as possible by writing every other line in red ink. Incidentally his verses show
that he expected noble readers. We know of no other nation of western Europe
which, in the first half of the eleventh century, could boast of a reading public
that included laymen of noble rank.
A 17-line fragment of a poem in honor of Aldhelm (the famous English
prelate and scholar) has come down in the tenth-century MS 326, CCCC.
This poem is written in a curious mixture of English, Latin, and Greek not
unsuited to its subject: Aldhelm had a weakness for showing off his learning.
The anonymous poet probably wrote in Canterbury at a date not much earlier
than that of the MS. The mixture of tongues in his poem reminds one of the
charters, and differs from macaronic verse.17
The metrical writings of King Alfred will be taken up along with the prose
in which they are imbedded.
The influence of southern culture on English secular poetry has shown
itself chiefly, so far, in the choice and treatment of subject-matter, but two
of the heroic poems that survive show marked influence in other ways as
well. One of these poems, Waldere, 18 has come down in a state so
fragmentary that we must set it aside for the moment. The other, however,
Beowulf,19 with its 3182 lines, gives us a broader basis for judgment. This
famous poem, the chief literary monument of the Old English period, is
the fourth article in the Nowell codex (see above, p. 67). The MS text is
divided into a prologue and 43 fits. We look first at the theme of the
poem. For this the poet turned to the heroic age of the Germanic peoples;
more precisely, to heroes of the fifth and sixth centuries. And he chose for
his setting Scandinavia, that motherland (or vagina nationum, as Jordanes
puts it) from which so many Germanic tribes, the English among them,
had gone forth down the years. 20 The poem thus celebrated, not
contemporary deeds of heroism, but events of a past already remote, already
glorified by a tradition centuries old. This tradition in its beginnings made
part of the cultural baggage which the Germanic settlers in Britain brought with
16

Text in Kiapp-Dobbie, VI. 9798.
18
Ed. F.Norman (1933). See also MA, X (1941). 155158.
19
Facsimile ed.: J.Zupitza, EETS, 77 (London, 1882). Best printed editions: in English, F.Klaeber
(Boston, 1922; 3ed. 1936); in German, E. von Schaubert (Paderborn, 1940), also referred to as 15th
ed. of Heyne-Schckings Beowulf. Most comprehensive study: R.W. Chambers, Beowulf, An
Introduction(Cambridge, 1921; 2ed. 1932). See also W.W. Lawrence, Beowulf and Epic Tradition
(Cambridge, Mass., 1928) and H.Schneider, Dos germanische Epos (Tbingen, 1936). A good recent
verse translation is that of C.W.Kennedy (Princeton, 1940).
20
See K.Malone, in Namn och Bygd, XXII (1934). 41, 51.
17
SECULAR POETRY
93
them from Sleswick. It had taken a shape specifically English by the eighth
century, when in all likelihood Beowulf was composed.21 In drawing from it,
the poet followed his own needs, not modern taste; too many critics have
scolded him for this.22 The action of the poem falls into two main parts. In
part one, the hero Beowulf, then young, goes from his homeland to Heorot,
the hall of King Hrothgar of the Danes, in order to cleanse it of Grendel, a
troll who for years had haunted it at night; he overcomes Grendel singlehanded
and afterwards slays Grendels mother, who sought to avenge her son. In
part two, the hero, now grown old, goes out to defend his own kingdom of
Geatland against the ravages of a dragon; with the help of a faithful young
kinsman he kills the dragon but himself falls in the fight. These idealized
folk-tales are not told in isolation, or for their own sakes; they make part of
an elaborate complex of fact and fable, matters of pith and moment,
involving the fortunes of three Scandinavian kingdoms, those of the Geats,
the Danes, and the Swedes, over a period of several generations. The poet
has painted a vast canvas. And in glorifying his hero he has not forgotten to
glorify as well the heathen Germanic courtly culture of which that hero
was the flower. He gives us a spiritualized picture of the Germanic heroic
age, an age the memory of which the English of the poets day cherished as
their very own. We believe that Beowulf was meant to serve a purpose not
unlike that which the neid of Virgil served: each poem exalted a past
which by tradition or fiction belonged to the cultural heritage of the poets
nation. In each poem, moreover, this exaltation of the past took place under
the influence of a foreign culture: pagan Greece in the neid, Christian
Rome in Beowulf. The English poet accordingly pictures a society heathen
and heroic, but strongly colored by Christian ideals of thought and deed. In
particular, the hero is made as Christ-like as the setting would permit:
highminded and gentle, he fights chiefly against monstrous embodiments
of the forces of evil, and in the end lays down his life for his people. But the
Christianity known to the poet had itself been strongly colored by the,
culture of classical antiquity. Latin was the language of the Church in Old
England, and Roman poets were read and studied by learned clerics like
the author of Beowulf. We believe that the English poet knew the neid
and was influenced by it in designing and composing his own poem.23 Alongside
this influence, which made for epic breadth and leisure, we put the influence of
English religious poems like Genesis, likewise marked by length and fullness in
their narrative art. The Beowulf poet certainly showed originality when, in
celebrating a secular hero of the Germanic past, he did not compose a song
after the manner traditional to the scops (who before him had monopolized
21
A recent discussion of the date of Beowulf is that of D.Whitelock, The Audience of Beowulf
(Oxford, 1951). pp. 2229. See also H.M.Flasdieck, Anglia, LXIX (1950). 169171.
22 See J.R.R.Tolkien, Proc. Brit. Acad. XXII (1936). 245285 and K.Malone, RES, XVII (1941).
129138. See also J.R.Hulbert, MP, XLIV (1946). 6575.
23
See T.B.Haber, A Comparative Study of the Beowulf and the neid (Princeton, 1931). See also
A.Brandl, Archiv, CLXXI (1937). 165173.
94
such themes), but used, instead, an elaborate, sophisticated narrative form

reminiscent of the neid. In doing so, however, he was only carrying into the
secular field a process of amplification and complication which, as we have
seen, had already set in among the composers of English religious verse.
More striking is the originality of Beowulf in structure. The two main
parts balance each other admirably, exemplifying and contrasting as they do
the heroic life in youth and age. By treating in full two chapters only of
Beowulfs career, the poet makes his tale marvelously simple, at bottom. The
elaboration, which Grundtvig has aptly likened to the multitudinous
embellishments of a Gothic cathedral, not only lends richness and variety to
the action, but also makes the hero and his deeds part of the age in which he
and they are set. Since the scene is laid in Scandinavia, most of the allusions
and episodes deal with Scandinavian history and story, but other quarters of
Germania are brought into the picture as well. Eormenric and Hama stand
for the east. The allusions to the fall of Hygelac, and the Finn and Ingeld
episodes, serve to link north and west. The association of Sigemund with
Heremod, and the (rather artificial) connection of both with Beowulf himself,
have a like function, while Offa, the representative of the Angles (the poets
own tribe), though introduced by a tour de force, well symbolizes the unity
of ancient Germania: in after years both English and Danes claimed him for
their own. In these and other ways the poet rises above mere story-telling; he
brings before us a whole world, the heroic age of his forefathers and ours.
But the greatness of Beowulf lies largely if not chiefly in its wording, and here
the poet is no innovator; he is rather the master of a traditional style, a mode
already old in his day. In the words of M.B.Ruud,24 Beowulf has
a magnificence of language which leaves critic and translator helpless. Indeed, if
the poem has a weakness as a work of art, it lies in this all-pervasive artistry.
Beowulf seldom pierces one with a stab of eloquence straight from a heart on
fireas lesser poems do, even Maldon; it carries one along on a great golden
stream of poetic rhetoric. It is a great literary tradition at its finest flowering.
Beowulf may not be one of the half-dozen great poems of the worldI confess
I do not knowbut for sheer style, there are not many works to be put above it.
Waldere
With Beowulf we take the two Waldere fragments (of 32 and 31 lines
respectively). These are recorded on two pieces of vellum, all that is left of
an English MS of the late tenth century (167b, Royal library, Copenhagen).
The verses are done in a style so broad and leisurely that they presumably
made part of a long poem (one of 1000 lines or more, perhaps)25 in which
was celebrated the fight between the hero Waldere and a band of
Burgundians led by King Guthere. This fight is known to us from other
24
25
MLQ, II (1941). 138139.

For a different view, see F.P.Magoun, MLN, LIX (1944). 498499.
SECULAR POETRY
95
sources, notably the tenth-century Latin poem Waltharius,26 from which we

learn that it was a fight of one against twelve, not counting the spectator
Hagena (though he too was finally drawn in). In Waldere as in Beowulf the
theme is secular, the treatment involved and sophisticated, bookish rather
than popular. Both poems, moreover, celebrate events of the Germanic heroic
age. The fragments are long enough to reveal that Waldere lacks the greatness
of Beowulf. Its clerical composer, however, had considerable skill in
versification, and though he used a German source he was steeped in
traditional English poetry sacred and profane. In losing Waldere we lost a
good poem and a stirring tale.
26
For an earlier date, see K.Strecker, in Deutsches Archiv fr Geschichte des Mittelalters, IV (1941).
355381. Ed. K.Strecker, Ekkehards Waltharius (Berlin. 1924). Translated byH. M.Smyser and
F.P.Magoun, Jr., in Connecticut College Monograph No.1 (Baltimore, 1941), pp. 111145.
X
Literary Prose
Prose
as an
Art Form
King
Alfred
All compositions in verse may be reckoned examples (by intention, at least)

of literary art. This does not hold for prose compositions. In Old English
times, even as now, prose was the normal form of non-literary speech and
writing, and of the prose works left to us from the period we limit ourselves
to those more or less literary in character. The literary prose of Old English is
made up, for the most part, of translations or paraphrases of Latin writings.
The English did not cultivate prose as an art form until they became
acquainted with Latin literature, which gave them both sources and models
for prose works of art. These sources and models, chiefly compositions of
Christians though they were, had maintained the traditional great prose
genres: history, philosophy, and oratory. In addition, minor genres like the
epistle were represented. Everywhere, however, new wine had been poured
into the old bottles. Thus, the oration appeared as a sermon. It was this
Christianized classical tradition which the Roman missionaries brought to
England and which the converts and their sons carried on in Latin and
English. Throughout Old English times literary prose remained learned and
clerical; for the people, verse continued to be the only natural medium of
literary art.
In spite of what we have just said, English literary prose owes its start to
an unlearned layman. In the seventh and eighth centuries, the golden age of
Old English literary culture, the prose writers composed in Latin only, so
far as we know,1 and it was left for King Alfred (849899) to promote and,
finally, himself to undertake composition in English when, in the last two
decades of the ninth century, he tried to build up anew that flourishing
civilization which the Danish invasions had brought to wrack and ruin.
The writings of Alfred and his men must not be thought of as works of art;
whatever literary merit they have is a by-product only. They were written
as part of an educational program. Alfred hit upon the simple but
revolutionary idea of using the mother tongue rather than Latin as the
basic medium of instruction, both in the schools and in adult education.
1
Except for Bedes incomplete translation of the Fourth Gospel, unhappily lost. An Old English
Martyrology which antedates King Alfred should also be mentioned; ed. G.Herzfeld, EETS, 116 (1900).
The editor dates the work c. 850 and localizes it in Lincolnshire. F. Liebermann, Archiv, cv (1900). 87,
gives reasons for localization at Lichfield. The treatise on Kentish and other English saints published
by Liebermann under the title Die Heiligen Englands (Hanover, 1889) seems to be little more than a
ninth-century list, later extended by combination with another (non-Kentish) list. The treatise thus
comes under the head of mnemonic prose. In its final form it is to be dated c. 1030.
96
LITERARY PROSE
97
Unluckily no English schoolbooks or works of reference existed. The King

therefore with characteristic energy set out to fill the gap. He began with the
history of the nation. We have no contemporary evidence of his part in
compiling the Old English Annals (the so-called Chronicles)2 or in preparing
the Old English version of Bedes ecclesiastical history,3 but we may reasonably
presume (though we cannot prove) that he had something to do with both
these undertakings; certainly the earliest extant form of each goes back to the
time of Alfreds literary activity, and each was traditionally associated with
Alfred.4 We are better informed about the Old English versions of two works
by Pope Gregory the Great: the Dialogues5 and the Pastoral Care.6 The former
was translated for Alfred by his friend Bishop Wrferth of Worcester; the
latter Alfred himself turned into English with the help of four scholars whom
he names in his preface. Here ends what may be called the earlier period of
Alfreds literary career. The later period begins with his translation of the
world history of Orosius.7 Next comes Alfreds major work, from the literary
point of view: his translation of the treatise of Boethius on the consolation of
philosophy. 8 Toward the end of his life he composed his Blostman
(Blossoms), culled chiefly from the Soliloquies of St. Augustine.9 The twelfthcentury historian William of Malmesbury tells us that Alfred began but did
not live to finish a translation of the Psalter,10 and it has been conjectured
that William is referring to the incomplete prose translation (Psalms, 150)
recorded in the Paris Psalter; unluckily the MS itself throws no light on the
identity of the translator.11 Asser, the biographer of Alfred, tells in some detail,
under the year 887, of yet another work: a Handbook which the King in that
year began to compile. It seems in fact to have been a commonplace book.
Possibly some of the passages entered in this book found place in the Blostman;
the book as such has not survived.12
2
Ed. C.Plummer, Two of the Saxon Chronicles [A 1 and E] Parallel, with Supplementary Extracts
from the Others (2v., Oxford, 18921899); H.A.Rositzke, C text (1940, in Frsters Beitrge zur
englischen Philologie, XXXIV); E.Classen and F.E.Harmer, D text (Manchester, 1926); A.H.Smith,
The Parker Chronicle (1935); trans. G.N.Garmonsway (1953).
3
Ed. T.Miller, EETS, 9596 and 110111; J.Schipper, Bibl. der ags. Prosa, IV. See also F.Klaeber,
Anglia, XXV (1902). 257315; XXVII (1904). 243282, 399435.
4
According to Gaimars Estorie des Engles (twelfth century), lines 3451ff., Alfred had an English
book written, consisting of events and laws, etc.; the reference is evidently to some MS (like the Parker)
in which the annals are followed by legal texts. We have two Old English references to Alfred as
translator of Bede: (1) in an eleventh-century MS of the Old English translation Alfred is named as
translator; (2) lfric in his homily on Gregory the Great speaks of Alfred as translator.
5
Ed. H.Hecht, Bibl. der ags. Prosa, v. See also P.N.U.Harting, Neophilologus, XXII (1937). 281
302.
6
Ed. H.Sweet, EETS, 45 (Part II) and 50 (Part I).
7
Ed. H.Sweet, EETS, 79 (Part I: Old English text and Latin original). The second part has never
come out.
8
Ed. W.J.Sedgefield (Oxford, 1899).
9
Ed. H.L.Hargrove, Yale Studies in English, XIII; W.Eadter, Bibl. der ags. Prosa, XI.
10
De Gestis Regum Anglorum, II. iv (sec. 123).
11
Ed. J.W.Bright and R.L.Ramsay, The West Saxon Psalms (Boston, 1907); see also J.H.G.Grattan,
MLR, IV (1909). 185189.
12
An English translation of sops fables is attributed to Alfred by Marie de France in
the epilogue of her Esope or Fables (twelfth century), and Miss Helen Chefneux in her study
Gregory
98
Asser
Bede
Dialogues,
Pastoral
Care
Orosius
Asser, who wrote in 893, might have been expected to mention any books
that Alfred had written or inspired up to that date. He actually mentions
only Wrferths translation of Gregorys Dialogues, but some version of the
Annals must have been known to him, since in his biography he includes
much annalistic matter up to the year 887. From Assers silence we are bound
to infer that the Pastoral Care, and of course all the works of Alfreds later
period, were written after 893. The Bede, too, was presumably finished after
893, though quite possibly begun much earlier. It is best described as a revision
of the original, made to fit the work into Alfreds educational program. Much
was left out, condensed or summarized, while other parts were translated
literally, to the sacrifice of English idiom now and again. In boldness of excision
the translator reminds one of Alfred, but his literal renderings are less
reminiscent of the King, who worked by paraphrase despite a few Latinisms.
The other two translations of the earlier period, those from Gregory, show
less literalness, but greater fidelity to the texts, since they omit little and add
little. Wrferth might be expected to understand his text better than Alfred
understood his, but in fact the King does better than the bishop, thanks, no
doubt, to the help he got. The works of the later period are marked by great
boldness in the treatment of the text. Alfred felt free not only to omit but also
to insert almost at will. Thus, the geographical chapter in Orosius struck him
(rightly enough) as deficient when it came to Germany and Scandinavia. He
therefore interpolated the famous account of the voyages of Ohthere and
Wulfstan, together with a long and valuable section on Germanic and Slavic
tribal geography in the ninth century.13 In all his writings the King was
concerned, not so much to reproduce his originals faithfully as to produce
books good for his subjects and simple enough for them to understand.
Through these books he hoped to give them an education at once practical
and liberal. The history of the English nation and of the world, the principles
of philosophy and the principles and practice of Christianity, such was the
reading-matter to be pondered by English youths and men engaged in learning
how to read and write their mother tongue. And in the Dialogues of Gregory
he even provided edifying escape literature: stories of the wonders and miracles
wrought by God and by saintly men of old.14
Alfred did his paraphrases in prose. To the Pastoral Care, however,
he added two passages in verse: one of 16 lines at the beginning (between
preface and table of contents) and one of 30 lines at the end. Moreover,
of the fables depicted on the Bayeux Tapestry (Romania, LX [1934]. 135, 153194) makes it seem
likely that the designer(s) of the tapestry drew on this lost English version of sop. For the so-called
Proverbs of Alfred see below, p. 152.
13
The latest discussion of King Alfred as geographer is that of R.Ekblom, Studio Neophilologica,
XIV (1942). 115144; reviewed by F.Klaeber, ibid., xv. 337338. See also A.S.C.Ross, The Terfinnas
and Beormas of Ohthere (Leeds, 1940), and K.Malone, Speculum, v (1930). 130167 and VIII (1933).
6778.
14
Bedes History is largely made up of like stories, of course. Alfred himself wrote a brief preface
for Wrferths translation of the Dialogues, and the translator added a preface of his own: 27 lines of
verse in which he sings the Kings praises.
LITERARY PROSE
99
after he had finished his prose rendering of Boethius, he made a verse rendering
of most of the metrical parts of this work.15 For the metres of Boethius, then,
we have two Alfredian versions, one in prose and one in verse. The verse
rendering depends on the prose, not directly on the Latin metres, and there
are indications that when Alfred did the verses his prose rendering had been
finished and set aside long enough to grow cold in his mind. Alfred was not
a man trained in literary composition, and neither his prose nor his verse
merits much praise as such. At times he rose above himself and gave us prose
passages worthy of a skilled craftsman, but these passages are the exception,
not the rule. His accomplishment stands out more clearly when we consider
his work in the large. Though he began to write late in life, and had no
tradition of English literary prose to feed, on, he managed to overcome many
of the ills that beset the beginner, and, in hours snatched from his manifold
duties as head of the state and father of his people, he was able to produce a
body of writings impressive in quantity, expressive of his personality, and
readable enough. Moreover, in his later period, at least, he showed a
remarkable independence of his originals. Most important of all, he gave
prestige to prose composition in English, and thereby opened the way to the
cultivation of important literary genres hitherto neglected.
In the year 891 some compiler, probably a cleric in King Alfreds service,
finished a set of annals devoted chiefly to the history of the English from
their settlement in Britain to the year of compilation, though not without
record of other events in Britain and elsewhere (the earliest event recorded
is Julius Caesars invasion of Britain). The compiler used various sources,
such as earlier annalistic matter, genealogies, Bedes History, and oral reports.
A number of copies of his text seem to have got into circulation; in all
likelihood King Alfred had them made and distributed among his bishops
(or abbots), with instructions to keep them up to date.16 Certainly his
educational program would require some such distribution, and we know
that he so distributed the Pastoral Care. None of these original copies of
the Annals survive, but the seven extant versions all descend in one way or
another from the compilation of 891. As time went on, entries were added
in various MSS by successive annalists. The A1 text (CCCC 173) was carried
down to 1070; the A2 text (Otho B XI), to 1001; the B text (Tib. A VI), to
977; the C text (Tib. B I), to 1086; the D text (Tib. B iv), to 1079; the E text
(Laud 636), to 1154; the F text (Dom. A VIII), to 1058. The Annals thus
record contemporary events of the ninth, tenth, eleventh, and twelfth
centuries, besides the earlier events which the original compiler set down
from various sources. For the historian of England these Annals are
obviously of the first importance. Here we are concerned with them as
literature. One goes to annalistic writing with no high expectations; the form
15
Preserved in MS Cotton Otho A VI.

Continuations, compiled at some center (presumably Winchester), seem to have been sent out
from time to time; but the matter is too intricate for treatment here. The Old English Annals are often
called less accurately the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
16
Boethius
The
Old
English
Annals
100
thelwold
does not lend itself well to artistic effects. The early annals in particular give
us, for the most part, mere lists of events, not narrative accounts, and the
annalist for 755, who tried his hand at narration, did a bungling job, though
he had a stirring story to tell (that of Cynewulf, Cyneheard, and Osric).17 The
narrative passages grow better in the ninth-century annals; the writers usually
express themselves clearly and simply enough, and show some skill in avoiding
the monotony so often found in annalistic writing. With the death (in 924) of
King Edward the Elder, however, the Annals begin to languish, and they do
not regain their Alfredian vigor and fullness until the reign of King thelred
the Redeless (9791016), when a truly literary historical prose emerges and
maintains itself to the end of the Old English period. Evidently a traditional
craftsmanship had begun to take shape in the midst of political disaster.
Moreover, expertness in prose composition was not peculiar to the later
annalists; it marks other writings of the period as well. If Old English poetry
flowered in the late seventh and eighth centuries, Old English prose flowered
in the late tenth and eleventh. We therefore reckon classical, not the early
prose of Alfred and his men, but the late prose of the annalists and of other
writers taken up below.18
We have seen that the politically glorious tenth century was marked by a
decline in English prose, while thelreds calamitous reign and the triumph
of the Danes in the eleventh century did not keep English prose from reaching
heights of achievement worthy of the name classical. Alfred had laid the
foundations on which the classical Old English prose writers built, but it
was the monastic reform movement of the tenth century, led in England by
Dunstan, thelwold, and Oswald,19 which produced and cherished the
builders. thelwold himself set going the second or classical period of Old
English prose with a translation of the Rule of St. Benedict20 which he made
about 960.21 The extant copies of this work all go back to a text made for
nuns, but the original text presumably was made for monks weak in Latin.
In a historical appendix, found in one MS only,22 thelwold explains that
the translation owed its existence to King Edgars initiative, and it seems
evident that the King in having it made was following the example set by
his great-grandfather. thelwold goes on to apologize for the translation,
which he thought of as a concession to weakness (strict disciplinarian that
he was), but the Alfredian tradition proved strong enough to overcome
whatever scruples he may have had. Indeed, he did his work in the spirit of
Alfred: his version of the Rule is a paraphrase, not a literal rendering, and
17
See F.P.Magoun, Anglia, LVII (1933). 361376, and C.L.Wrenn, History, XXV (1940). 208215.
See C.L.Wrenn, Trans. Phil. Soc. for 1933, pp. 6588.
Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 988); thelwold, Bishop of Winchester (d. 984); Oswald,
Bishop of Worcester and Archbishop of York (d. 992).
20
Ed. A.Schrer, Bibl. der ags. Prosa, II.
21
Schrer, p. xviii. But F.Tupper, MLN, VIII (1893). 350, dates the translation about 970.
22
Cotton Faustina A x. Old English text and modern rendering in T.O.Cockayne, Leechdoms, etc.,
in. 432444. The appendix may have been composed by 970, though Liebermann, Archiv, CVIII (1902).
375377, dates it after the death of Edgar in 975.
18
19
LITERARY PROSE
101
shows everywhere his concern to make things clear and simple for the reader.
The smoothness and general competence of thelwolds English may reflect,
more or less indirectly, the schooling he got under Dunstan at Glastonbury;
certainly he was a man schooled and trained, not a self-taught writer like
Alfred.
We come now to the leading prose writer of the period: lfric23 (c. 955c.
1020), sometime pupil of thelwold at Winchester and lifelong disciple of
his old master. lfrics many writings include homilies, pastoral letters, lives
of saints, versions of books of the Bible, learned works of various kindsa
whole library to meet practical needs of the Church in his day. We pass over
his Grammar and Glossary, with their pendant the Colloquy, in spite of their
great cultural interest,24 and begin with the 120 sermons, in three series of 40
sermons each, which he wrote between the years 990 and 99825 while a monk
at Winchester or Cernel. The first and second series go by the name Homiliae
Catholicae; the third series is called Passiones Sanctorum. These serial titles,
however, cannot be taken strictly; saints lives are included among the homilies,
and homilies among the saints lives. Each sermon was written for use on a
suitable day of the Church year; thus, the sermon on Gregory was to be
preached on March 12 (the day of that saint). Through his vernacular sermons
lfric sought to make things easier for the preachers, who could use the
discourses which he provided, without having to wrestle with the Latin
originals, the meaning of which, in spots at least, those weak in Latin might
find it hard to fathom. For sources lfric drew on the abundant stock of
sermons and other religious writings available in Latin; he made particular
use of Gregory, Bede, and Augustine. He treated his sources with great
freedom, adapting the material to the needs of English pastor and flock. All
three series are marked by good construction and clear, happy expression; as
W.P.Ker has said, lfric is the great master of prose in all its forms.26 The
series differ somewhat in style. In the first, alliteration is used now and then
to heighten the effect; in the second, this device is used more freely; in the
third, many passages are written in a rhythmic alliterative prose which some
scholars have wrongly taken for verse and even printed as such. lfric in his
rhythmical effects was following a fashion of his time, found in Latin prose
and carried over into vernacular composition.27 We note also, as we proceed
from series to series, a shift of balance: the story looms larger, the moralizing
23
See C.L.White, lfric(Yale Studies in English, II). Ed. Bibl. der ags. Prosa, I (Grein), III
(Assmann), IX (Fehr), x (Crawford); EETS, 76, 82, 94, 114 (Skeat), 160 (Crawford), 213 (Henel). For
other editions see CBEL, 1. 8992. Miss Dorothy Whitelock, in MLR, XXXVIII (1943). 122124,
points out the inadequacy of the evidence for the date of lfrics death.
24
Ed. J.Zupitza, lfrics Grammatif und Glossar (Berlin, 1880); G.N.Garmonsway, lfrics
Colloquy (1939). These works may have grown out of his experiences as teacher of oblates at the
monastery of Cernel in Dorsetshire (987989). See above, p. 18.
25
The first series was finished in 990 or 991; the second, in 992; the third, between 993 and 998.
See K.Sisam, RES, VII (1931). 1618, VIII (1932). 55, 6768.
26
English Literature, Medieval, p. 55.
27
G.H.Gerould, MP, XXII (1925). 353366. Cf. also A.Cordier, LAllitration latine (Paris, 1939).
lfric
102
commentary smaller. The saints lives in particular28 tend to become tales of

wonder not unlike the legends of Middle English times.
Alongside the three series of sermons we set, as a fourth major work of
lfric, the so-called Heptateuch, an English version of the first seven books
of the Bible. This version seems to have been made in several stages. Genesis
was translated in 997 or 998, at the instance of the ealdorman thelweard,
to whom its epistolary preface is addressed. For the same nobleman, and
presumably at about the same time (if not earlier), .lfric turned Joshua into
English. The exact times and occasions of composition cannot be given for
the other books of the Heptateuch, but the whole was hardly complete by
1005, when lfric became Abbot of Eynsham in Oxfordshire. The seventh
book, Judges, was not included in the B text (MS Claudius B IV), and though
included in the L text (MS Bodley Laud Misc. 509) it is there set off from the
rest by a blank page; presumably Judges was first composed as an independent
work, or as a fellow of the homilies on other books of the Bible: Kings and
Maccabees, incorporated into the third series of sermons; Job, used in the
second series; Judith; and Esther. The whole Bible was summarized by lfric
in a treatise (really two treatises) on the Old and New Testaments written for
a certain Sigwerd, and this treatise has been taken for an introduction to the
Heptateuch, though its place in the MS (Bodley Laud Misc. 509) does not
support the theory. Introduction or no, the treatise was composed later than
the Heptateuch proper; not earlier than 1006, not later than 1012. If we
compare lfrics Heptateuch with the original we find it a volume of
selections; large parts of the scriptural text are omitted. This holds least for
Genesis, though even here omissions may be noted. In general, lfric left out
things which he thought unsuitable for an English layman. Incidentally he
thereby made his version more readable. Whatever he chose to translate he
reproduced faithfully, with due regard to English idiom. He made much use
of alliteration and rhythm here as elsewhere. For the latter part of Genesis,
and perhaps for Exodus and Leviticus as well, lfric had before him an
English translation made by somebody else; this translation he seems to have
incorporated (in somewhat revised form) into his own version. His procedure
here is indicative of the man: he saw no reason to work out a fresh version
when one already existed which with a little patching could be made to serve.
His sermons meant more to him. Here he was capable of discarding earlier
work of his own for the sake of giving more adequate treatment to a theme.
Thus, the Hexameron, a homily on the Creation, treats more fully a theme
which he had already used in the Catholic Homilies, and the MS evidence
suggests that lfric wrote the Hexameron to take the place of this earlier
creation sermon.29
In general, lfrics literary activities grew out of practical needs or demands;
28
On their form, see D.Bethurum, SP, XXIX (1932). 515533.

The name Hexameron was traditional; lfric presumably got it from Bede. The six parts implied
answer to the six days of Creation but lfric gives us much not mentioned in the Bible; his chief extrabiblical source was Bede.
29
LITERARY PROSE
103
here he followed the tradition of Alfred, whose writings he knew. Sometimes

lfric himself took the initiative in meeting such needs. In other cases he
wrote to order: thus, bishops would commission him to prepare pastoral
letters for use in their dioceses, and patrons (as we saw above) would ask him
for English renderings or summaries of Holy Writ. Whatever the
circumstances, his work shows a high level of competence, and often rises to
aesthetic heights in its kind. lfrics artistic achievement, however, should
not make us lose sight of the didactic purpose and effect which, for him,
alone gave point to the labor of composition. The things he wrote proved, in
fact, so well adapted to the needs of pastoral and monastic instruction that
they withstood the cultural collapse brought on by the Norman Conquest,
and kept alive till better days the tradition of English devotional prose.
The chief literary contemporary of lfric was his superior and friend
Wulfstan,30 Bishop of London (9961002), Bishop of Worcester (10021016),
and Archbishop of York (10021023). He died in 1023. He is best known as
a homilist. Indeed his literary fame rests mainly on a single homily composed
in the troublous year 1014: the eschatological Sermo Lupi ad Anglos.31 He
begins conventionally enough with the statement that this world is in haste,
and it draws nigh to the end. In other words, Doomsday is almost upon us.
The evils of the time drive the preacher to his fateful conclusion, evils which
he proceeds to particularize in vigorous speech. The English by their sinful
ways have called down these evils upon themselves, and unless they repent
and turn from wickedness to righteousness they will have every reason to
quake before the judgment which is at hand. This powerful and timely sermon,
thundered from the pulpit by Wulfstan himself or by some other clerical
orator, might well have brought an eleventh-century congregation to sackcloth
and ashes. Even today, after more than 900 years, its fiery periods stir the
heart. The sermons of lfric were written to instruct; those of Wulfstan, to
move; both homilists in the process produced works of art unmatched in
their respective kinds. Wulfstan has aptly been compared to an Old Testament
prophet; certainly he speaks with prophetic eloquence and zeal. The canon of
his works remains a problem.32
The Blickling Homilies,33 a batch of 19 sermons in a MS of c. 970 and
named (by modern scholars) after the former home of the MS, antedate the
homilies of lfric and Wulfstan. Their literary merit is small, and we need
do no more than mention them here. The 23 prose pieces of the Vercelli
Book, a collection made c. 1000 if not earlier, are mostly homilies,34 but
include a fragmentary life of St Guthlac.35
30
Sec A.[S.] Napier, Wulfstan (Berlin, 1883); D.Bethurum, PULA, LVII (1942). 916929.
The best edition is that of D.Whitelock (1939).
32
But see K.Jost, Anglia, LVI (1932). 265315.
33
Ed. R.Morris, EETS, 58, 63, 73. See also A.E.H.Swaen, Neophilologus, XXV (1940). 264272,
and R.Willard, Univ. of Texas Studies in English, 1940, pp. 528.
34
Ed. (first half only) M.Frster, Bibl. der ags. Prosa, XII.
35
A fuller text of the prose Guthlac is recorded in MS Cotton Vesp. D XXI. Edition, based on both
texts, by P.Gonser, Anglistische Forschungen, XXVII (Heidelberg, 1909).
31
Wulfstan
Blickling
and
Vercelli
Homilies
104
Gospels
Apollonius
Summary
A number of other homilies and legends have come down to us, singly and
in groups. Some of them still await publication.36 We do not treat them in
this history, but pass on to the gospel translations and other prose works.
The West Saxon version of the four gospels37 is commonly dated c. 1000. The
translation, idiomatic but faithful to the Vulgate text, bears comparison with
the Authorized Version of 1611 in literary quality.38 The so-called Lindisfarne
and Rushworth gospels are only glosses, and do not concern us here. The
same may be said of the many glossed texts of the Latin Psalter. Such works
as the penitentials attributed to Archbishop Egbert of York39 likewise have
little or no literary interest; they are essentially (ecclesiastical) legal texts.
The many legal documents of Old English times have already been looked at
(above, pp. 3538) for the metrical bits which they incorporate. We omit
from this history any consideration of legal prose. The Handbook of
Byrhtferth,40 and other works of interest to the historian of science,41 we
likewise omit. The translation of that famous medieval collection of proverbs
known as the Distichs of Cato42 may be worthy of mention. The most notable
piece of late secular prose, however, is the Old English version of the Apollonius
of Tyre story.43 This romance of classical antiquity, deservedly popular in the
Middle Ages, found an English translator even though it served for
entertainment pure and simple. Unluckily only a fragment of the translation
has survived. Its author shows considerable skill in that difficult art; his version
reads well and gives us some idea of what the English literature of
entertainment might have become but for the Norman Conquest. Of less
interest are two secular prose pieces recorded in the No well codex:44 the Old
English version of Alexanders Letter to Aristotle, and a piece known as
Wonders of the East. Both these pieces, along with Apollonius and many a
saints legend, show a taste for Oriental wonders and adventures, a taste
which the crusades were destined to whet.
During the late tenth and eleventh centuries, the classical period of Old
English prose, many writers were active and much good prose was written.
Homiletic prose in particular reached heights of achievement comparable to
the masterpieces of modern times. Historical prose, too, flourished, and
36
On the unpublished homilies of MS CCCC 41, see R.Willard, in Frsters Beitrge zur englischen
Philologie, XXX (1935). 2.
37
Ed. J.W.Bright (4v, 19041906). On the Vulgate text used by the translator, see H. Glunz, in
Frsters Beitrge, IX (1928) and Klner anglisusche Arbeiten, XII (1930).
38
Here may be mentioned the Old English version of the apocryphal gospel of Nicodemus. Text
and discussion by W.H.Hulme in PMLA, XIII (1898). 471515 and MP, I (1904). 579614. Ed.
E.J.Crawford (Edinburgh, 1927).
39
Editions: Poenitentiale by J.Raith (1933); Confessionale by R.Spindler (1934).
40
Ed. S.J.Crawford, EETS, 177 (1929). See also H.Henel, JEGP, XLI (1942). 427443, and
Speculum, XVIII (1943). 288302.
41
Many texts may be found in O.Cockaynes Leechdoms, Wort-Cunning, and Starcraft (3v, Rolls
Series, 18641866); see also G.Leonhardi, Bibl. der ags. Prosa, VI (1905), and H. Henel, EETS, 213
(1942).
42
Ed. J.Nehab, Der altenglische Cato (Berlin, 1879). See also G.Schleich, Anglia, in (1880). 383
396.
43
Ed. J.Zupitza, Archiv, XCVII (1896). 1734. See also P.Goepp, ELH, V (1938). 150172.
44 Ed. S.Rypins, EETS, 161 (1924).
LITERARY PROSE
105
a beginning was made with scientific prose. Moreover, prose writers even
ventured into the realm of fiction, territory hitherto monopolized by verse.
Had this rapid development kept up, the twelfth and thirteenth centuries
might have been as glorious in English literature as they actually were in
Icelandic. But William of Normandy won at Hastings. King Alfred, the noblest
Englishman of them all, had laid out the garden of English prose. lfric and
his fellows brought it to high cultivation, and extended it with new plantings
full of promise. The Normans laid it waste, and slew its keepers.45
45
A.Brandl sums up the matter thus (Grundriss, p. 1133): In the last phase of Old English culture,
creative power was still active in the most diverse fields. In poetry the rise of rime was opening the way
to a flowering of song. In prose, a homiletic style of singular force and vigor had grown up, and at the
same time story telling made its way in a fullness comparable to the period of the crusades. In science,
meager though the achievement, the zeal of the students was worthy of praise, while not only a great
man [lfric?] but also an organization extending over the whole country provided for popular education.
It was no tired, late autumnal culture but a field freshly sown with many promising seeds upon which
fell the foreign rule of the Normans like the snows of winter. Less authoritative but of particular
interest to Americans is the judgment of Ralph Waldo Emerson (English Traits [Boston, 1903], pp.
6061): Twenty thousand thieves landed at Hastings. These founders of the House of Lords were
greedy and ferocious dragoons, sons of greedy and ferocious pirates. They were all alike, they took
everything they could carry, they burned, harried, violated, tortured and killed, until everything English
was brought to the verge of ruin.
BOOK I
The Middle Ages
PART II
The Middle English Period
(11001500)
Guide to reference marks

Throughout the text of this book, a point set beside a page number
indicates that references to new critical material will be found under an
identical paragraph/page number (set in boldface) in the BIBLIOGRAPHICAL
SUPPLEMENT.
In the Index, a number preceded by an S indicates a paragraph/page number
in the BIBLIOGRAPHICAL SUPPLEMENT.
I
General Characteristics of the Period
The Middle English period may be defined chronologically as the period
from 1100 to 1500. Some scholars prefer to date the beginning from 1150,
and, so far as literature in English is concerned, there is much to be said for
this view. It is not merely because little or nothing in English has come down
to us from the first half of the century and what has, such as the Old English
Annals (Anglo-Saxon Chronicle) carried on at Peterborough until 1154, is
better thought of as a continuation of what went before, but because the
changes in the Old English language, especially the wearing away of inflections,
and the reflection of these changes in the orthography reach a point about
1150 which justifies our setting at this date the boundary between Old and
Middle English. When we consider, however, that English literature is rightly
to be thought of as the literature written in England,1 reflecting English life
and thought, whether it is written in English or in French or Latin, we may
with equal justice begin our present survey with the opening of the twelfth
century. The adoption of 1500 as a closing date has only the convenience of
a round number to recommend it. However, most of fifteenth-century literature
belongs indisputably to the Middle English tradition, and those developments
at the end of the century which look forward to the Renaissance of the next
are not of a revolutionary character and may be considered as faint stirrings
of the new spirit helping to remind us of the complexity characteristic of any
period, rightly considered, of literary history.2
1
From the latter part of the fourteenth century on we must include the work of certain Scottish
writers.
2
The most valuable tool for the study of Middle English texts is John E.Wells, A Manual of the
Writings in Middle English, 10501400 (New Haven, 1916), with periodic supplements, now nine
in number. Vol. 1 of the CBEL covers this period. Briefer bibliographical guides are W.L.Renwick
and Harold Orton, The Beginnings of English Literature to Skelton1509 (1940), and Roger
S.Loomis, Intro. to Medieval Literature, chiefly in England: Reading List and Bibl. (1939).
Indispensable is Carleton Browns Register of Middle English Religious and Didactic Verse (2v,
191620; Bibliographical Soc.). The second volume, revised and enlarged to include the secular
verse, by Carleton Brown and Rossell H.Robbins, has been issued as An Index of Middle English
Verse (1943; Index Soc.). Valuable bibliographical material is presented in Josiah C.Russell, Dictionary
of Writers of Thirteenth Century England (1936; Bull. Inst. of Hist. Research, Special Suppl. No. 3).
Additions appear from time to time in the Bulletin. Important older works are Thomas Tanner,
Bibliotheca Britannico-Hibernica (1748), John Pits, Relationum Historicarum de Rebus Anglicis
(Paris, 1619), John Bale, Illustrium Majoris Britanniae ScriptorumSummarium (Ipswich, 1548;
enlarged ed., Basle, 15579), Bales Index Britanniae Scriptorum, ed. R.L.Poole and Mary Bateson
(Oxford, 1902), John Leland, Commentarii de Scriptoribus Britannicis (2V, Oxford, 1709), and
Thomas Wright, Biographia Britannica Literaria, Vol. II: Anglo-Norman Period (1846).The Middle
English period receives extensive treatment in Bernard Ten Brink, Gesch. der englischen Literatur
(2ed., 2V, 18991912; English trans., 3v, 188396), suggestive but now somewhat antiquated. The
109
The Period
Defined
110
The
Norman
Conquest
THE MIDDLE ENGLISH PERIOD
In this period of four hundred years the dominant factor which changed
the whole course of Middle English literature, as of English history during
the same period, was the Norman Conquest. In 1066 William, the Duke
of Normandy and one of the worlds great figures, claimed the English
throne as the next of kin to Edward the Confessor. He supported his claim
by invading England with an army of Norman and French soldiers led by
adventurers, ambitious nobles, and the younger sons of many important
French families, conquered his rival, Harold, at the Battle of Hastings,
and was crowned king. It required four years to stamp out opposition
and win complete recognition, four years filled with ruthless campaigns
in which he all but wiped out the English nobility. His Norman and French
supporters who had made the conquest possible were rewarded with the
lands and titles of the English nobles. The result was a new aristocracy in
England, an aristocracy almost wholly French. Normans and French filled
all important positions in both Church and State. Foreign in nationality
and temperament, in tradition and association, they added a new element
to the English nation and brought new qualities of mind and character to merge
discussion in J.J.Jusserand, Histoire littraire du peuple anglais (2ed., 2v, 18961904) is along more
general lines. The English trans. has the title A Literary History of the English People (2ed., 3V, 1906
9). Still of importance is A.Brandl, Mittelenglische Literatur in H.Paul, Grundriss der germanischen
Philologie, Bd. II, Abt. I (1893), pp. 609718. Wm. H.Schofields English Literature from the Norman
Conquest to Chaucer (1906) is readable and well known. There are useful but uneven chapters in the
CHEL and bibliographies in the CBEL. C.S. Baldwin, Three Medieval Centuries of Literature in
England, 11001400 (Boston, 1932), P.G. Thomas, English Literature before Chaucer (1924), and
R.M.Wilson, Early Middle English Literature [to 1300] (1939) may be noted. The last best represents
the present status of scholarship. Hans Hecht and L.L.Schcking, Die englische Literatur im Mittelalter
(1927) is slight. W.F.Kers English Literature: Medieval (n.d.) in its brief compass is richly suggestive.
Remarkable for its time was Thomas Wartons History of English Poetry (177481), best consulted in
the edition of W.C.Hazlitt (4V, 1871).For the Old French background the student should consult
Gaston Pariss classic, La Littrature franaise au moyen ge (4ed., 1909) or the Esquisse translated
as Medieval French Literature (1903); Karl Voretzsch, Intro. to the Study of Old French Literature
(1931, from the third German ed.); Urban T.Holmes, History of Old French Literatureto 1300 (2ed,
Chapel Hill, 1937); G.Grber, Franzsische Literatur in Grbers Grundriss der romanischen
Philologie, Bd. II, Abt. I (1902), pp. 4331247; and the monumental Histoire littraire de la France
(39v, 17331950, in progress). On the Latin literature of the Middle Ages see the references at the end
of ch. v.For the historical background the reader may consult H.W.C.Davis, England under the
Normans and Angevins (1905), Kenneth H.Vickers, England in the Later Middle Ages (1913), George
B.Adams, The History of England from the Norman Conquest to the Death of John (10661216)
(1905), T.F.Tout, The History of England from the Accession of Henry III to the Death of Edward III
(12161377) (1905), and C: Oman, The History of England from the Accession of Richard II to the
Death of Richard III (13771485) (1906). Charles Gross, The Sources and Literature of English
Historyto about 1485 (2ed., 1915) is invaluable. On English life in the Middle Ages the following
are of interest: Medieval England, ed. H.W. C.Davis (Oxford, 1924); A.Abram, English Life and
Manners in the Later Middle Ages (1913); L.F.Salzman, English Life in the Middle Ages (Oxford,
1926); and the first two volumes of H.D.Traills Social England (rev. ed., 19014). For a more general
view of the Middle Ages see G.G.Coulton, Medieval Panorama (1938); The Legacy of the Middle
Ages, ed. C.G.Crump and E.F.Jacob (Oxford, 1926); Karl Vossler, Medival Culture, trans. W.C.Lawton
(2V, 1929), with an extensive bibliography by J.E.Spingarn; Henry Osborn Taylor, The Medieval Mind
(2V, 1911); Henry Adams, Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres (1904); and, for the fullest treatment and
widest scope, The Cambridge Medieval History (8V, Cambridge, 191136). Further references may be
found in Louis J.Paetow, A Guide to the Study of Medieval History (rev. ed., 1931).
GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE PERIOD
111
in time with those of the Anglo-Saxon. The practical and enterprising qualities
of the Norman, and the French instinct for symm etry and order became part
of the English race, and as characteristics of the race were reflected in English
literature.
A more immediate consequence of the Norman Conquest was the
introduction of French into England as the normal language of the governing
class. The new nobility knew no English, and it is unlikely that they made
much effort to become acquainted with it. The tradition that William in the
Conqueror made an unsuccessful attempt to learn the language is not too
well founded. On the other hand there is abundant evidence that for at least
two hundred years the nobility everywhere used French. We must remember
that the conquerors came to England to enrich themselves, not to identify
themselves with a people and a national culture which they regarded, with
some justice, as less sophisticated than their own. They retained political and
property interests in France which required frequent and extended sojourns
there. Residence in England was not a matter of choice but of political
necessity and financial expediency. Even the small percentage of the English
nobles who acknowledged Williams claim and retained their estates and
titles soon learned French as the language of the class with which their own
interests were most closely identified and with which they were mostly
associated. The English language naturally continued to be spoken by the
mass of the people, but it was the language of the uncultivated. England was
thus in the unhappy linguistic situation of a house divided against itself. As
to some extent in Belgium today, two languages were in use side by side, one
by the upper class, economically and socially, the other by the common
people.
How long such a situation would have continued if events had not
occurred to bring about a change no one can say. Probably in time the
weight of numbers would have told and English would once more have
become the language of the whole country. But in 1204 England lost
Normandy and an important political condition favorable to the
maintenance of French in England came to an end. From this date we note
the growing tendency for nobles with land in both France and England to
divide their possessions geographically among their children and for
members of a family to reach a similar agreement among themselves.
Finally in 1244 decrees of the King of France and the King of England
made it illegal for any one to hold lands in both countries. It is significant
that the influx of French words into the English vocabulary assumes really
large proportions in the period following 1250, a pretty clear indication
that English is coming to be spoken by those accustomed to the use of
French. The half century from 1250 to 1300 is the period during which the
transition from French to English as the language of the nobility was
occurring. By the beginning of the fourteenth century English is for all
practical purposes universal. The author of a romance, writing not later
than 1325, remarks that everybody now knows English and many a noble
The
French
Language
in England
Recovery
of English
112
Periods of
Middle
English
Literature
can speak no French. From this time on a knowledge of French in England

is merely a fashionable accomplishment or a cultural asset.3
The linguistic situation here described had an important effect upon the
production of literature in the native tongue and determined in no small
measure the character of that which was produced at different stages of the
Middle English period. It would be wrong to suppose that the Norman
Conquest caused a sharp cleavage, cutting off suddenly native production.
Rather it altered the course of the native tradition, forced it for a time to run
under ground, narrowed the stream. This will be apparent if we examine
Middle English literature as a whole, for we will find that it falls into certain
well-marked periods.4 There is first the period running to 1250, the period
during which English was the language of only the lower classes. It would be
useless to look in it for romances and other types popular at the court. These
were being produced in French, the language of the class to which poets
looked for patronage. Since writing in English was bound to be without
material rewards to the writer, we must look to the clergy for most of what
was intended for the common people. It is not surprising, therefore, to find
English writings at this date predominantly religious, representing the efforts
of those in the Church to instruct the people in Bible story and in the ways of
right living. The Ormulum (see p. 158) is a typical work of the first period
the Period of Religious Record.5 When the upper classes begin to adopt English
we get a much more varied literature in the native language. The object of
English writings becomes entertainment as well as edification. Our earliest
romances in English, for example, belong with one exception to the second
half of the thirteenth century, and the hundred years from 1250 to 1350 are
known as the Period of Religious and Secular Literature. When after 1350
English is once more secure as the language of both the court and the people
and there has been sufficient time for the tentative and experimental efforts
that seem to precede major literary periods, we reach the high point in Middle
English literature. The fifty years from 1350 to 1400, in which Chaucer,
Wyclif, Langland, and the Pearl poet, not to mention significant but less
spectacular figures, appeared, has been called the Period of Great Individual
Writers. The remaining hundred years, the fifteenth century, are for a time
dominated by the influence of Chaucer and towards the end look forward to
the developments which make the sixteenth century one of great literary
renaissance. This century may be thought of as the Imitative or Transition
Period.
3
For a full treatment of the relation between French and English in England after the Norman
Conquest see the present writers History of the English Language (rev. ed., 1957), chs. V and VI.
4
These chronological divisions were first suggested by Brandl in his Mittelenglische Literatur,
noted on p. 110.
5
The name is meant to suggest that classification is necessarily based on what was recorded in
writing and therefore survived. There was doubtless much popular literaturesong, ballad, story
which lived only on the lips of the people and the wandering minstrel and which therefore has not
come down to us. Cf. p. 209.
113
The effect on literature of the Norman Conquest as we have so far described

it is largely indirect, the consequence of the fact that a new ruling class, alien
in speech, came into being, interrupting the normal literary development and
temporarily forcing English prose and poetry into the background. But the
new influence was not merely negative or entirely bad. The Norman
conquerors and those who later came in their train brought to England much
that was new and stimulating and valuable. They brought with them their
Continental tastes and the literature on which those tastes had been formed.
French literature in the twelfth century had burst suddenly into flower and
was enjoying one of its great periods. It was the leading literature of Europe,
rich and varied in theme, polite and urbane in spirit, easy and confident in
performance. This literature circulated as freely at the English court as in
France. In time it furnished a large body of new material for English poets
and gave them new models and standards for imitation and emulation. The
new wealth of the Norman nobles attracted French minstrels and poets to
the English court and insured liberal rewards for their effort to provide solace
or pleasing edification (cf. pp. 135 ff.). The policy of the Conqueror of filling
English churches and monasteries with learned Norman bishops and abbots
men like Lanfranc and Gilbert Crispinhowever detrimental it was to pastoral
needs, gave a needed stimulus to English intellectual life. The close political
connection with France, at first through Normandy and later through extensive
English possessions in Anjou, Maine, Aquitaine, and Guienne, put an end to
any sense of isolation that may have existed and brought England into the
stream of Continental thought and culture. The English language was enriched
with thousands of French words, becoming a more cosmopolitan and supple
medium of literary expression, and the old Teutonic alliterative verse was
largely replaced by the French syllabic line, standard all over Europe. We
should look upon the Norman Conquest as bringing about the early merging
of two great literary traditions, the Teutonic tradition which early England
shared with other northern nations and the Romance tradition with its main
source in France.
English literature in the period following the Conquest is in three
languagesLatin, French, and English. Latin, as already in Old English
times, was not only the language of learning but the vernacular of the
learned, and the character of such twelfth-century works as Walter Maps
De Nugis Curialium and Geoffrey of Monmouths Historia attests its use
outside the narrower field of scholarship. In French a large body of poetry
was written in England or for English patronage and constituted for over
two hundred years the literary entertainment of the English court. It is
natural for us to take greater interest in the literature written in our own
mother tongue and to trace its course as a separate stream. But whatever was
written in England, expressing English thought and reflecting English social
and intellectual conditions, is rightly to be considered a part of the national
literature. For more than half of our period it is possible to distinguish
between what was written for the aristocratic class and what was intended
Effects of
Norman
Conquest
on
Literature
Literature
in Three
Languages
114
Some
Characteristics of
Medieval
Literature
for the people merely by the language in which it is written. Even after
English had regained its position at court numerous works avow their
authors intention of writing for lewd men, that is, the ignorant. Seldom
outside of the Middle Ages is literature quite so class conscious. A great part
of Middle English literature, for whatever class intended, must be recognized
as derivative, secondary, and imitative. English writers eagerly adopted the
themes and fashions of French literature, offering hospitality to the Song of
Roland and showing a nice impartiality towards heroes of the French
national epic. All through the thirteenth and much of the fourteenth
centuries the literature of England was constantly indebted to French
originals and followed French example. We are here, as always, speaking of
what has been preserved. Popular poetry, which must have existed even
though it has not come down to us, was surely thoroughly English. But of the
productions that took written form a large number derive directly or
ultimately from France. Even a British legend like that of King Arthur
reached English romance not directly from the Celts but through the French
romances of Chrtien de Troyes and his successors. The general character of
Middle English literature will be imperfectly apprehended unless we
recognize its tri-lingual form, its class distinctions, and its great indebtedness
to French sources and models.
There are other general features of Middle English literature which should
be noted, but these are characteristic of all medieval literature. One is what
might be called its impersonality. In the first place a great deal of Middle
English literature is anonymous. We dont know the names of those who
wrote it. It is partly that people were more interested in the poem than in the
poet, just as we admire the Lincoln Memorial and marvel at the Empire State
Building without making an effort to learn who were the architects. The
medieval author was at a disadvantage compared with popular writers today
in having no publisher interested in keeping his name before the public.
Again, the reproduction of books by hand tended to give them in time a
communal character. A text was exposed both to unconscious alteration and
conscious change. The medieval scribe was as likely as not to assume the rle
of editor or adapter, so that different manuscripts of a work often differ
greatly from one another. Except in the case of a few works of well-known
writers a medieval production was subject to the whims of successive
generations of scribes. A third consideration tending to give an effect of
impersonality to literature was the differing attitude of the Middle Ages
towards originality. Originality was not a major requirement of medieval
authors. Story material in particular was looked upon as common property
and the notion that one could claim property rights in ideas is seldom
encountered. To have based ones work on an old and therefore authoritative
source was a virtue which led Geoffrey of Monmouth and even greater
writers to claim such a source when none existed. It is not surprising that
such an attitude raised translation to the level of original creation.6 The
reader must be prepared for a less personal quality in medieval than in
115
modern literature and to find that the original author of a work is often, for
us, without a local habitation or a name.
Certain other characteristics distinguish medieval literature as a whole,
and in some cases the literature between 1100 and 1500 from that of either
earlier or later periods. One such characteristic results from the presence of
women in the audience. We have only to notice the difference between Beowulf
and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight to realize the change that takes place
in narrative poetry when it passes from the mead-hall to the castle. Beowulf
is heroic, Sir Gawain courtly in tone. In the second place, one is constantly
aware in medieval literature of the all-important place of the Church in
medieval life. It is often said that men and women looked upon this life mainly
as a means to the next. Certainly they lived in much more fear of Hell and its
torments and were vitally concerned with the problem of salvation for their
souls. Religious writings are, therefore, a large and significant part of medieval
literature, not off to one side as in our day, but in the main stream. They bulk
large because religion overtopped the common affairs of life as the cathedral
dominated the surrounding country. Thirdly, even where religion is not directly
concerned, a moral purpose is frequently discernible in literature, openly
avowed or tacitly implied as the justification for its existence. John of Salisbury
in his Policraticus says that all writings serve a practical purpose and this
purpose is to convey useful knowledge and promote virtue.7 In the Middle
Ages the literature of knowledge and the literature of power, to use De
Quinceys distinction, are often close together if not much the same thing.
Lyric poetry passes easily from ecstasy to warning, and in narrative the will
to delight is often partner with the will to teach. Finally, it should be noted
that much of literature until near the end of the Middle Ages-was meant to
be listened to rather than read. Until we approach the fifteenth century, literacy
was not widespread even among the upper classes and books were expensive.
Most people were dependent upon song and recitation, upon the minstrel
and the poet reading his work, for their literary recreation. As a result, verse
is the normal medium for most forms of literature. Much that would now be
written in prosehistory, popular instruction, moralizingwas put into verse
as the form more easily carried in the memory and more pleasant to listen to.
It remains but to say a word in this chapter about the quality of medieval
literature as art. And we must admit at once that judged by modern
standards much of medieval literature, Continental as well as English, is
infra-literary.8 This does not mean that there are no great works of the
imagination in the Middle Ages. There are some, but poems like the Divine
Comedy are rare in any age. To admit that most works written between
the Fall of Rome and the Renaissance do not claim a place among the
6
7
8
Deschamps addresses a complimentary poem to Chaucer as grand translateur.

Book VII, chs. 911.
The word is F.J.Mathers: cf. The Bookman (N. Y.), XXV (1907). 617619.
Artistic
Quality of
Medieval
Literature
116
worlds greatest books is not to deny real interest and importance to the
period. To the true humanist every effort of the race to express itself is of
interest. The child is father of the man, and in medieval literature there is
much of the simplicity of the child. Beauty is not to be denied on the grounds
of immaturity, and simplicity itself is not without charm. With Gaston Paris
we may recognize that it is not always for us to judge and to prove but to
know and to understand. Medieval writing lacks the immediate appeal of the
contemporaneous. The human mind grasps more easily the productions of
its own day. There are fewer obstacles to understanding. Differences of
language and custom will always limit the enjoyment of early literature to
the cultivated few. But acquaintance with the past brings understanding, and
understanding begets sympathy, appreciation, pleasure. One is privileged in
this modern world to waive aside the literature of the Middle Ages, to reason
that with life so short and art so long to learn, it is better to snatch the
pleasure within easy reach, but such a one will not see later literature in
historical perspective and he will miss a body of writings which,
sympathetically approached, will be found to contain much of interest, and,
as Rossetti observed, beauties of a kind which can never again exist in art.
II
The Survival of the Native Tradition (11001250)
The state of England on the eve of the Norman Conquest is a question on
which opinion is divided. The older view, that the history of the AngloSaxon
from the time of King Alfred to the Norman Conquest is little else than the
history of disorganization, degeneracy, and decay,1 has been sharply
challenged.2 No doubt there was political and social slackness, but there was
also heroism at Senlac. England was in a transition stage and Old English
literature was likewise in transition. We can hardly expect new Beowulf s in
the eleventh century. The heroic age was past; we do not find new Iliads in
the Age of Pericles. Old English writers were turning to new themes such as
Apollonius and Alexander,3 themes which they were getting from the Continent
and treating in the Continental manner. There is, of course, no way of telling
what English literature would have become if it had been allowed to pursue
its own course, but its normal development was interrupted by the Conquest.
The Normans were not hostile to the native tradition. The decay of literary
activity is suffiently explained by the destructive effects of four years of ruthless
war, the rapid displacement of English bishops and English abbots in the
monasteries, the eviction of the English language and English culture from
the place they should have occupied in the national life, and the complete
indifference of the new rulers to books in a language which they did not
understand. Writing in the native tongue was paralyzed, but, as we shall see,
it was not dead.
One indication that interest in the older literature did not die with the
Conquest is the fact that Old English manuscripts continued to be copied.
Two of the six MSS of the West Saxons Gospels belong to the twelfth century
and we have twelfth-century copies of King Alfreds Boethius, the Distichs
of Cato, the Gospel of Nicodemus, numerous homilies of lfric and others,
to mention only a few. Another indication is the fact that the Old English
Annals were kept up for nearly a hundred years. One manuscript, now
lost, was continued in the south of England until 1121 when it was
borrowed by Peterborough, possibly to replace a copy destroyed by fire
in 1116, and not only copied but carried on there until 1154. Finally there is
1
T.Duffus Hardy, Descriptive Catalogue of Materials Relating to the History of Great Britain (3V
in 4, 186271), 11. p. xi. The view was echoed by Gaston Paris, La Posie du moyen ge (Paris, 1885
95), 11. 467.
2
Cf. CHEL, I. 166; R.R.Darlington, The Last Phase of Anglo-Saxon History, History, XXII
(1937). 113; R.M.Wilson, Early Middle English Literature (1939), pp. 322; and above, p. 105.
3
See above (p. 104) for Apollonius of Tyre, The Wonders of the East, etc.
117
Literary
Conditions
at the
Conquest
Old
English
Survivals
118
Continuity
with the
Past
a good bit of evidence that ballads and poems on historical and legendary
themes were still being sung in the time of William of Malmesbury (c. 1125)
and Henry of Huntington (d. 1155). The latter includes translations into
Latin of a number of such songs, and William of Malmesbury tells many
stories of Athelstan and Edgar and Queen Gunhilda which he says he has
learned from cantilenae and nostro adhuc seculo etiam in triviis cantitata.
There were legends of Offa,4 of Wade, several times alluded to5 but now
known only in Latin epitomes such as Walter Map gives in his De Nugis
Curialium (cf. p. 146), and of Hereward, the last of which is preserved in a
Latin form based, as the author tells us, on an English original. While we
must be careful not to attribute literary form to every popular story that has
found its way into the chronicles, the lost literature of the period following
the Norman Conquest was evidently considerable.6
Continuity with the past is likewise evident in some of the earliest texts in
Middle English. It can perhaps best be seen in certain miscellaneous collections
of religious material. These are made up mostly of prose pieces of varying
character and length, rather loosely classified as homilies. Two such collections,
the Lambeth7 and Trinity Homilies,8 occur in MSS written around 1200 and
on linguistic grounds are thought to have been copied in London.9 But from
mistakes which the scribe makes in the Lambeth MS it is apparent that he was
working over older originals and there are indications that his originals were
in a dialect further to the south and west. Two of the homilies and part of a
third are from lfric. The Trinity collection does not betray its dependence
upon an older source by mistakes of the scribe, but five of its pieces are also
found in the Lambeth MS and the collection is presumably based in like manner
on older material. A third group, the Bodley Homilies10 is almost wholly made
up of pieces from lfrics homilies and Lives of Saints, and from Wulfstan
and other Old English homilists, while the fourth collection, the Vespasian
Homilies,11 seems to be a commonplace book of extracts and adaptations,
mainly from lfric. There is much that is interesting from the point of view of
legend and popular belief in these homiletic textspieces on the Eight Vices, the
4
The Latin text of the Lives of the Two Offas is printed in R.W.Chambers, Beowulf: An Introduction
(2ed., Cambridge, 1932), pp. 217243.
5
Cf. Chaucer, Merchants Tale, E. 1424.
6
Cf. R.W.Chambers, The Lost Literature of Medieval England, Library, n.s. V (1925). 293321;
R.M.Wilson, Lost Literature in Old and Middle English, Leeds Studies in English and Kindred
Languages, II (1933). 1437; More Lost Literature in Old and Middle English, ibid., V (1936). 1
49; More Lost Literature, ibid., VI (1937). 3049; C.E.Wright, The Cultivation of Saga in AngloSaxon England (Edinburgh, 1940).
7
Richard Morris, Old English Homilies, First Series (18678; EETS, 29 and 34), pp. 1189.
8
Richard Morris, Old English Homilies, Second Series (1873; EETS, 53).
9
See H.C.Wyld, South-Eastern and South-East Midland Dialects in Middle English, E&S, VI
(1920). 112145.
10
Partially edited in A.O.Belfour, Twelfth Century Homilies in MS Bodley 343 (1909; EETS, 137),
and A.S.Napier, History of the Holy Rood-tree (1894; EETS, 103).
11
Rubie D-N.Warner, Early English Homilies from the Twelfth Century MS Vesp. D. xiv (1917;
EETS, 152). These are not to be confused with the four Kentish homilies in the Cotton MS Vesp. A.
XXII. The sources have been fully worked out by Max Frster, Der Inhalt der altenglischen Handschrift
Vespasianus D. XIV, ESt. LIV (1920). 4668.
THE SURVIVAL OF THE NATIVE TRADITION
119
Eight Virtues, the Seven Holy Sleepers, the Gospel of Nicodemus, the History
of the Holy Rood Tree, Signs before Judgment, etc.but we are interested in
them here for the evidence they furnish of the continuity of English prose,12 a
continuity unbroken by the Norman Conquest. Such continuity in verse is
less well attested, but appears to some extent in the Worcester Fragments,
containing among other things an early form of the Body and Soul theme,
and the fragment of twenty-five lines of alliterative verse known as The
Grave.13 Both of these are conceivably Old English pieces in a twelfth-century
form.
In the search for the beginnings of Middle English verse a few short pieces
assume importance on account of their age. The earliest, if we disregard the
Curse of Urse,14 is Cnuts Song. In Book II of the Liber Eliensis, which is to
be dated between 1108 and 1131, we are told that King Cnut, accompanied
by Queen Emma and important men of his kingdom, on one occasion making
his way by boat to Ely to celebrate the Feast of the Purification, heard the
music of the abbey service floating across the water and ordered the boatmen
to pull him nearer the church while he drank in the melody. And he himself
expressing with his own lips the joy in his heart, composed a song in English
in these words, the beginning of which runs thus:
Merie sungen e muneches binnin Ely
a Cnut ching reu er by.
RoweS, cnites, noer the land
And here we es muneches sng.15
The historian tells us that these and the verses that followed were sung even
down to his own day publicly in groups (in choris) and that the story of their
origin was preserved in popular tradition. The passage sounds like an
expression of local pride in which an Ely monk called to mind an incident
treasured in the monastery. A second local incident is somewhat obscurely
represented in the Here Prophecy, five lines of verse (c. 1191) referring
12
See the important essay of R.W.Chambers, On the Continuity of English Prose from Alfred to
More and His School (Oxford, 1932), originally printed in EETS, 186.
13
The Worcester fragments of the Body and Soul and the The Grave (Bodl. MS 343) are printed in
R.Buchholz, Die Fragmente der Reden der Seele an den Leichnam, in Erlanger Beitrge, VI (Erlangen,
1890). Cf. Louise Dudley, The Grave, MP, XI (1914). 429442, and Eleanor K.Heningham, Old
English Precursors of The Worcester Fragments, PMLA, LV (1940). 291307.
14
In the conquest of the west by the Conqueror, Gloucester and Worcester were put under the
sheriff Urse of Abetot, who built a castle encroaching on the lands of the monks of Worcester. The
monks appealed to the Archbishop, who came and uttered a malediction against the offender, the
beginning of which is quoted by William of Malmesbury:
Hattest u [art thou called] Urs?

Have u Godes kurs.
Unfortunately he gives the rest only in Latin.
15
Merrily sang the monks within Ely

When Cnut the king rowed thereby.
Row, knights, nearer the land
And let us hear the song of the monks.
Cnuts
Song
120
apparently to a place in Northamptonshire.16 But the most interesting from a

literary point of view are three little poems known as st. Godrics Hymns.17
St. Godrics St. Godric, who died in 1170 at the somewhat mature age of a hundred and
five, was born in Norfolk and after a career as a peddler, a merchant and
ship-owner, and a pilgrim to Rome, Jerusalem, and other holy places, finally
settled down as a hermit near Durham. In certain more or less contemporary
lives of the saint are preserved the three short poems attributed to him,
addressed to the Virgin and to St. Nicholas. His Hymn to the Virgin may be
quoted for its artless charm and simple piety:
Sainte Marie, Virgine,
Moder Jesu Cristes Nazarene,
Onfo, scild, help in Godric,
Onfang, bring hehlic wi e in Godes ric.
Sainte Marie, Cristes bur,
Maidenes clenhad, moderes flur,
Dilie mine sinne, rixe in min mod,
Bring me to winne wi self God.
Poema
Morale
Receive, shieldbring him gloriously

with thee in Gods kingdom.
bower
maidens purity, flower of mothers
wipe outrule
joy
The words fit the liturgical chant to which they are set in the manuscript.18
St. Godrics Hymns are slight in themselves, but they are our earliest examples
of the Middle English lyric.
The keynote of English poetry, and indeed of English prose, in the second
half of the twelfth century is struck early in one of the most important
and spirited poems of this period, the Poema Morale19 or the Moral Ode
(c. 1170). In some four hundred lines of vigorous seven-stress verse the
poet preaches a sermon on the theme, repent before it is too late. His
method is suggestive of popular evangelism. He speaks first of his own
misspent life and then paints the terrors of Doomsday, the torments of
Hell, and the joys of Heaven. The beginning is somewhat disjointed and
incoherent, but when the preacher in him begins to speak, the style becomes
vivid, straightforward, and eloquent. There is a surprising note of cynicism
in the opening lines. Whoever trusts too much in wife or child instead of
thinking of himself is in danger of missing salvation. He will soon enough
be forgotten by his friends and relatives. Such a mood, however, early gives
way before the earnestness with which the author tries to make his points.
The rich think to find safety in wall and ditch, but he who sends his treasure
to Heaven need have no fear of fire or thief. Each man may purchase Heaven
with what he has, the poor man with his penny as surely as the rich with his
16
See discussion by W.W.Skeat and John W.Hales in Academy, XXX (1886). 189190, 380381.
Edited by J.Zupitza, Cantus Beati Godrici, ESt, XI (1888), 401432. See also J.W. Rankin,
The Hymns of St. Godric, PMLA, XXXVIII (1923). 699711, and Irene P.McKeehan, The First
Biography of an English Poet, Univ. of Colorado Studies, Ser. B 1 (1941). 223231.
18
A facsimile of one MS is reproduced as a frontispiece to Saintsburys History of English Prosody,
Vol. 1 (1906).
19
Hans Marcus, Das Frhmittelenglische Poema Morale kritisch herausgegeben (Leipzig, 1934;
Palaestra, No. 194).
17
121
pound. In the final doom a mans good works will all be known just as the
devils have all his misdeeds written down. Repent now! When Death is at the
door it is too late to cry for mercy. There is no virtue in hating evil when you
cant do evil any more. All the terrors of Hell which the Middle Ages knew
from the Visio Pauli are described in contrast with the joy which the blessed
experience in Gods presence. The wicked are enumerated in detailthose
who made vows to God and didnt keep them, who led their lives in war and
strife, who lied, cheated, persecuted poor men, etc., etc. The poet closes with
an exhortation to choose the narrow and difficult road, the road which few
follow. The poem is addressed to simple men and poor and must stand
as an illustration of matter and purposefor a number of other twelfthcentury pieces which we shall have to mention more briefly.
Similar in theme is a poem of 354 lines that has been named Sinners,
Beware.20 It lays the same emphasis on repentance and enforces its plea with
a description of the pains of Hell and a warning against the Seven Deadly
Sins, directed at various classes from covetous monks and mercenary priests
to rich men and proud women. It recalls the horrors of the grave, where the
body shall be eaten by worms, and pictures the Judgment Day when the cries
of those who would not confess their sins to the priest are contrasted with the
happy lot of those whom Christ recognizes as his friends who fed the hungry
and clothed the poor. The poem is conventionalall too conventionalin
theme, and unfortunately not distinguished in treatment. But it is remarkable
in being written in the six-line stanza aabaab later often found in the romance
and shows how far French verse patterns had penetrated into the English
verse tradition by the end of the twelfth century. More flexible and easy is the
style of the Paternoster,21 an exposition of the Lords Prayer in 305 fourstress lines riming in pairs. It is found among the Lambeth Homilies (cf. p.
118) and is obviously an intrusion among these prose pieces. But it is homiletic
in spirit, explaining the meaning and purpose of each petition, and bidding
Goodmen, listen to me.
Distinct echoes of the Poema Morale are found in a group of poems
belonging apparently shortly after the turn of the century and associated
in two manuscripts.22 They are unusually interesting, treating familiar
themes in a lively and fresh spirit, in verse that shows considerable metrical
skill. Most of them run from fifty to a hundred lines in length. Long Life
serves warning that though we may expect to live long, Death lurks in
our shoes and strikes suddenly. An Orison of Our Lady is a charming
expression of devotion to the Virgin, who brought light where Eve brought
night. This world will pass away. I have been a fool too long, says the poet. I
will mend my ways. Lady, punish me in this life or let me live to correct my
20
EETS, XLIX. 7283.

EETS, XXIX. 5571.
Cotton Caligula A. IX and Jesus Coll. Oxford 29. In both MSS they occur together and are
copied in the same order. The Cotton MS is dated before 1250. They are edited in R.Morris, An Old
English Miscellany (EETS, 49), pp. 156191.
21
22
Sinners,
Beware
Other
Religious
Pieces
122
faults. I am sorry for my sins. Mercy, Lady! Doomsday, which follows

immediately in both MSS, seems to be by the same author. When I think of
Doomsday, the poet reflects, full sore I am adread. Fire will consume
everything. When angels blow their trumpets the rich who wore fine clothes
and rode on palfreys will sing welaway. Christ will speak sweet words to the
righteous, but will banish the wicked to Hell. Let us pray our Lady, sweetest
of all things, to ask Heavens King to save us for her sake. The same thought
runs through the somewhat longer poem Death (264 lines). Hear of one
thing, it begins, ye that wear scarlet and pall and sit on your bench: no man
can escape death. At the latemost day our bliss is turned to nought. No tongue
can tell the pains of Hell. At death the body is sewed in a clout. Then saith
the soul with sorry cheer, Away, thou wretched, foul body,and so for the
greater part of the poem the soul berates the body with the familiar taunts
and accusations of The Debate between the Body and the Soul. Finally, in A
Little Sooth Sermon, there is a deal of plain speaking:
Herkne alle gode men
and stylle sitte a-dun,
And ich ou wile tellen
a lutel so sermun.
A Good
Orison
of Our
Lady
you
Adam brought us all to grief. He went to Hell. There also will go all backbiters,
robbers, thieves, and lechers, and dwell there forever. So will false chapmen,
bakers, and brewers, who hold the gallon down low and fill it with froth. All
priests wives shall be damned and those proud young men and women who
run to each other in church and market place and speak of clandestine love.
They take no thought of Mass and Matins; their paternoster is at home.
Robin will take Gill to the ale house, sit and talk and pay for her ale, and she
will go with him in the evening shamelessly. But the poet concludes as suddenly
as he began, with an appeal to his hearers to forsake their sins. There is
something refreshing about the poems in this little group, something that
helps us to understand better the secular verse, such as the Brut and The Owl
and the Nightingale, that was occasionally being written at about the same
date.
More varied in theme are a few scattered pieces that deserve to be
singled out from the body of religious verse that constitutes the most
characteristic expression of the poetic impulse before 1250. A Good Orison
of Our Lady23 is the work of a poet of the West Midlands writing either,
as some think, at the end of the twelfth century or more probably at the
beginning of the thirteenth. In it he professes with quiet simplicity his devotion
to the Virgin and prays for her protection. He will sing his lofsong to her by
day and by night. Angels delight to honor her. All who surround her are
crowned with golden crowns and Heaven is bright with her presence. He
laments his many sins, but says in extenuation that he forsook all that was dear
23
EETS, XXXIV. 191199.
123
to him and gave himself wholly to her. In the closing lines he voices the hope
that all my friends may be the better today that I have sung to thee this
English lay, and he prays that thou bring the monk to joy that made this
song of thee. It is a song in the Old English manner. The long lines at the
opening, with their irregular flow and alliteration, suggest chanting to the
accompaniment of a harp, but though the movement recalls the four-beat
rhythm of Old English verse, the alliteration becomes sporadic and the effect
of which we are finally most conscious is that of couplets bound together by
end-rime. As the monk has here set his love on the Virgin, so in Thomas of
Hales Love Rune,24 a poem of 210 lines written a generation later, a maid
of Christ is urged to choose as her lover the Heavenly Bridegroom. Worldly
lovers pass: where are Paris and Helen, Amadas, Idoine, Tristan, Iseult? Christ
surpasses them all in beauty and riches; even Henry, King of England, is his
vassal. His gift to his bride is virginity, most precious of gems. The poet, in
fulfilling the maids request, sends her his poem open and unsealed, with the
suggestion that she learn it and sing it and hope that Christ will make her his
bride. The Passion of Our Lord25 is an example of the longer, narrative poem,
strongly suggestive of the secular romance. In a short prologue the poet says
that his tale is not of Charlemagne and his twelve peers but of Christs passion,
which is not a fiction. Its seven-stress lines break into fours and threes with a
certain jog-trot swing, but the movement is rapid and the narrative anything
but pedestrian with its homely touches, realistic details, and frequent resort
to direct discourse. Toward the middle of the century a short poem called
When Holy Church Is under Foot,26 with its blaming of simony for the evil
state of the Church, shows English verse turned to the frank criticism of
contemporary conditions.
The Katherine Group

Up to this point all the writings which we have spoken of, except for several
collections of homilies, have been in verse. In some ways the prose of the
period is even more remarkable. It consists, in the first place, of five closely
related pieces known from the title of one of them as the Katherine Group.
They are lives of three women saintsSt. Katherine, St. Margaret, and St.
Julianaand two religious treatises, Hali Meidenhad and Sawles Warde. And
in the second place there is that extraordinary work, the Ancrene Riwle,
closely associated with these but so distinctive as to deserve consideration by
itself. It is impossible to assign precise dates to any of them, but general
opinion places them either toward the end of the twelfth century or early in
the thirteenth.
24
Thomas of Hales was a Franciscan. The Franciscans came to England in 1224. The poem was
probably written fairly early in the reign of Henry III (12161272); he is most likely the King Henry
twice mentioned in it. It is printed in EETS, XLIX. 9399.
25
EETS, XLIX. 3757 (706 lines).
26
EETS, XLIV. 89; on the date cf. C.G.Child, Papers in Honorof Charles Frederick Johnson
(Hartford, 1928), p. 101n.
Thomas
of Hales
Love
Rune
124
Exaltation
of
Virginity
St.
Katherine
St.
Margaret
The legends and treatises composing the Katherine Group in all cases but
one have as their primary aim the exaltation of virginity. They were all written
in the West Midlands, the evidence of dialect pointing to Hereford shire.
There are resemblances between some of them that suggest the pos sibility of
common authorship for part of the group. And finally, they are associated in
MS tradition: all five occur together in one MS, four appeal as a group in
another, and three are copied in close proximity in a third. None of them is
ever found separately.
All three of the saints legends tell a story of heroic resistance and ultimate
martyrdom in the heroines determination to preserve her maidenhood. St.
Katherine27 may be taken as typical. In ancient Alexandria the holy maiden
Katherine one day chides the Emperor for his sacrifices to false gods. Thinking
to overcome her scruples by reason, he sends for fifty of his finest scholars.
But she overcomes them and they confess themselves powerless before the
argument of one supported by the true God. The Emperor has them all burnt
and they die the happy death of martyrs. He next tries flattery on Katherine,
and the promise of worldly honors. But she replies that nothing can turn me
from the love of my beloved, in whom I believe. He has wedded himself to
my virgin state with the ring of true belief He is my life and my love,my
wealth and my joy; nor do I desire anything else. After this she is stripped
and beaten and thrown into prison, where she remains for twelve days without
food. During this time she is visited by the Queen and the captain of the
guard. Both are converted and the captain in turn converts the two hundred
knights in his company. Tortures are preparedfour wheels fitted with spikes,
turning two by two in opposite directions. At the prayer of the saint God
shatters the wheels, killing full four thousand of that accursed folk as they
stood round about. There one might have heard the heathen hounds yell
and cry and scream on every side, the Christians laugh. The Queen addresses
her husband: Wretched man that thou art, wherefore wilt thou wrestle with
the worlds ruler? What madness maketh thee, thou bitter baleful beast, to
war against Him who created thee and all earthly things ? For this
affectionate outburst she is tortured and put to death. The captain of the
guard suffers a like fate. Katherine is finally beheaded, and miracles accompany
her burial.
It has been necessary to recount the story at some length in order to
convey an idea of the subject matter and tone of these legends. St.
Margaret28 is very similar in story and treatment although Margaret, unlike
Katherine, does not court martyrdom. Her struggles are to escape marriage,
but she undergoes like torture and suffers the same end. There is the same
intemperate language. She rails at her intended husband: Thou workest
the works of thy father, the wicked one, the fiend of Hell. But, thou heathen
hound, the High Healer is my help; and if he have granted to thee my
body to tear, he will, thou hateful reeve, rid my soul out of thy hands and
27
28
E.Einenkel, The Life of Saint Katherine (1884; EETS, 80).

Frances M.Mack, Seinte Marherete (1934; EETS, 193).
125
carry it to Heaven. In prison she is swallowed by a dragon, but she has

made the sign of the cross, which causes the dragon to burst asunder, and the
maiden steps forth unharmed. She is visited by a black devil, but she cows
him and beats him and sets her foot upon his rough neck until he cries, Lady,
loose thy foot off my neck! The differences between the two lives are
accounted for by difference of source, but the resemblances are in features
and in details that do not occur in the Latin legends which lie behind the
English texts. St. Katherine and St. Margaret are either by the same author or
St. Margaret was written by some one who knew the St. Katherine well.29
St. Juliana30 is also a story of resistance to marriage. There are many marks
of resemblance to both of the legends previously mentioned, but the tone is
somewhat more restrained and the little touches that unite the St. Katherine
and the St. Margaret are not so apparent here.
Hali Meidenhad31 is an extended glorification of virginity in contrast with
the baseness and grievous annoyances of marriage. Vehemence and strong
conviction make up for the absence of a logical plan. There is little or no
progression, but a single idea runs through the whole treatisethat virginity
is in every way preferable to marriage. The idea is supported by the constant
recurrence of two arguments: virginity is the state most pleasing to God, and
marriage is not the happy lot that most people expect to find it. It is particularly
in the latter argument that the author is at his best. Ask even queens, and
countesses, and proud ladies about their life. If they acknowledge the truth I
will have them for witness that they lick honey off thorns. His picture of
fleshly intercourse is so vivid that it shocked his first editor into Latin, for his
rendering. It is a sorry picture that he paints of married lifequarrels between
husband and wife, the pains of childbirth, the trials of the mother. When she
comes in she hears the child scream, sees the cat at the flitch and the hound at
the hide; her cake is burning on the hearth and the calf sucks all the milk; the
crock spills into the fire and the churl scolds. In the light of such pictures of
the married womans life it is with good reason that the author urges the real
or imaginary maiden for whom he writes to choose single blessedness and to
think of Christ as her husband. In its wealth of homely illustration, its fondness
for the proverbial phrase, and its sustained interest Hali Meidenhad is strongly
suggestive of the Ancrene Riwle, but the uncompromising attitude towards
marriage makes one hesitate to attribute it to the same author.
29
E.Einenkel, ber den Verfasser der neuangelschsischen Legende von Katharina, Anglia, v
(1882). 91123, argues that the St. Katharine was written first, that the other two legends were by a
different author who used the St. Katharine, and that Hali Meidenhad was written after the St. Margaret
by still a third author.
30
S.T.R.O.dArdenne, An Edition of e Liflade ant te Passiun of Seint luliene (Lige, 1936; Bibl. de
la Facult de Philos, et Lettres de lUniversit de Lige, LXIV); also O.Cockayne and E.Brock, The
Life of St. Juliana (1872; EETS, 51). For Cynewulfs treatment of the rheme see above, p. 72.
31
A.F.Colborn, Hali Meihad (Copenhagen, 1940); also O.Cockayne, Hali Meidenhad (1866; EETS.
18). new edition by F.J.Furnivall (1922).
St.
Juliana
Hali
Meidenhad
126
Sawles
Warde
Prose or
Verse?
Prominance
of the
Southwest
The homily called Sawles Warde32 (The Safeguarding of Soul), although

found in all three MSS with which the Katherine Group is identified, stands
somewhat apart in theme and style. It makes only incidental mention of
virginity. It is an elaborate allegory of the house, symbolizing the body, whose
master is Wit and whose mistress is Will. The precious treasure of this house
is the soul, guarded by the four cardinal virtues. Most of the treatise is made
up of the discourse of two visitorsFear, the messenger of death, and Love
of Life, messenger of mirth. One describes at length the pains of Hell, the
other the joys of Heaven. It is an adaptation of a treatise of Hugh of St.
Victor called De Anima.
The prose style of the legends in the Katherine Group and of Hali Meid
enhad is marked by the frequent use of alliteration, and the rhythm of the
sentences is such that it can sometimes be read (with much forcing of the
accent) as a kind of verse, which has been compared to that of the Old High
German poet Otfrid in his Krist.33 But it is a mistake to think of these pieces
as anything but prose.
It is important to point out that such literary activity in English before
1250 as is surveyed in this chapter is practically confined to the west and
south of England. There are also reasons for assigning to the west the Ancrene
Riwle, which is the subject of the next chapter. Later we shall have occasion
to speak of the Ormulum, which belongs to the northeast Midlands, the
Essex Vices and Virtues, and the Proverbs of Alfred, which seems to have
originated near the southern border of the East Midlands.34 But of the works
so far considered practically all appear to have been written in the West
Midlands or within the limits of the late West Saxon kingdom. Two small
collections of Kentish sermons35 lie outside the area, but the rest all belong on
the evidence of dialect to the west and south. Were it not for the fact that
English was still being written in Essex and Kent and London (Lambeth and
Trinity Homilies) we should be led to believe that a literary tradition in English
lived on only where French influence was less felt. As it is, we must attribute
its other than sporadic survival to the strength of the Old English culture in
the districts which had least felt the devastating effects of the Scandinavian
invasions and which had been most directly under the rule of Alfred and his
successors.
32
Edited by R.M.Wilson (Leeds, 1938); also in EETS, XXXIV. 245267.

Cf. Einenkel, op. cit.; opposed by Schipper, History of English Versification (1910), and others.
34
All of these belong to the twelfth or the beginning of the thirteenth century, and are thus
contemporary with the literature here under consideration.
35
That in MS Vesp. A. XXII has been mentioned in footnote II, above. The other, consisting of five
short expositions in MS Laud 471, is of little interest except that the texts are translations of French
originals, which accompany them in the MS, and show a considerable French element in the vocabulary,
a fact which throws an interesting sidelight on the extent to which French words were understood by
English listeners at the beginning of the thirteenth century.
33
III
The Ancrene Riwle
The Ancrene Riwle1 (Rule for Anchoresses) is the most remarkable prose
work in English literature between King Alfred and Malory. To every new
reader it comes as a complete surprise that anything with so unpromising a
title should have so much interest and charm. Its appeal is not in its subject,
since this has lost much of its significance in a materialistic and often skeptical
world. But the freshness of its treatment and the personality of its author
which shines through every page remain undimmed after the lapse of seven
centuries. In two hundred pages of modern print this anonymous treatise
offers a complete guide to, and a warm justification of, the anchoresss life. It
is carefully planned throughout its eight distinctions or books. Book one is
devoted entirely to religious observances and devotional exercises. Then follow
books on the five senses as guardians of the heart, the advantages of a life of
retirement from the world, the temptations fleshly and spiritual which must
be resisted, confession, penitence, and the love of Christ. The eighth and last
book gives specific advice on domestic mattersfood, clothing, attendants,
and a variety of small but important and interesting points.
One circumstance that lends an attractive personal quality to the treatise
is the fact that it was not written for an unknown or imaginary audience
but was composed at the request of three young women who had
apparently long been known to the author. They were sisters in the literal
sense of the word. He says, There is much talk of you, how gentle women
you are; for your goodness and nobleness of mind beloved of many; and
sisters of one father and of one mother, having in the bloom of your youth,
forsaken all the pleasures of the world and become anchoresses. Not
only were they young when they entered upon their life of seclusion, but
they were still young at the time the book was written, as the general tone
implies. The phrase gentle women, moreover, is no mere allusion to mildness
of manner. They were almost certainly connected with a family of some social
position and wealth. I know not any anchoress that with more abundance,
or more honor, hath all that is necessary to her than ye three have; our
1
The only edition at present is that of James Morton, The Ancren Riwle (1853) in the Camden
Society, Vol. LVII, which contains a translation on opposite pages. The translation can be had separately
in the Kings Classics (now the Medieval Library) under the somewhat misleading title The Nuns Rule
(1905). A new edition of all the MSS is in preparation for the EETS by a group of scholars. In this
series two volumes have appeared: The Latin Text of the Ancrene Riwle,ed. Charlotte DEvelyn (1944;
EETS, 216), and The French Text of the Ancrene Riwle, ed. J.A.Herbert (1944; EETS, 219). In the
present book the spelling Ancrene Riwle, adopted by the EETS, is used.
127
Composed
for Three
Sisters
Their
Social
Position
128
Versions
in English,
Latin and
French
Lord be thanked for it. For ye take no thought for food or clothing, neither
for yourself nor for your maidens. Each of you hath from one friend all that
she requireth; nor need that maiden seek either bread, or that which is eaten
with bread, further than at his hall. They were permitted two servants.
Their education suggests that of the upper class. The author quotes Latin at
the very beginning without translation, although in general his practice is to
translate or paraphrase his Latin citations, and the young women are advised
to read either in French or English. Always the author seems anxious not to
overtax their endurance and he urges them strongly not to take any vows:
for, whoso undertaketh any thing, and promises to God to do it as his
command, binds herself thereto, and sinneth mortally in breaking it, if she
break it wilfully and intentionally. If, however, she does not vow it, she may,
nevertheless, do it, and leave it off when she will It is as though he realized
the possibility that they might not be able to endure the life they had entered
upon.2 Although such advice is not unknown to other treatises of the kind,
all this is consonant with the avowal that his rules are not intended for any
but you alone. Such a purpose is not in-consistent with a realization that his
book might come into the hands of others and therefore with his speaking
occasionally as though he had a wider audience in mind.
That his treatise attained to this wider circulation is evident from the
number of surviving MSS3 and from the fact that there were versions in
Latin and French as well as English.4 A question has naturally arisen as to
the language in which it was originally composed. We may be sure that it
was not Latin. The Latin version contains numerous mistakes which are
demonstrably due to misinterpreting the English. In the case of the French
the evidence of translation is less obvious but is quite decisive.5 Moreover,
manuscripts of the English text were in the late thirteenth and the fourteenth
century in the possession of religious houses with strong aristocratic
connections, in which French was certainly the more familiar language and
which would have preferred a French version if one had been obtainable.6
It was not unsuitable to private individuals, for it is in many ways an
admirable treatise on morals and a universal guide to piety. It is for this reason
2
It should be remembered, however, that St. Bernard had written in the same vein concerning
vows.
3
Counting complete and fragmentary texts and including adaptations, there are seventeen MSS
now known: eleven in English, four in Latin, two in French.
4
A growing list of quotations and echoes from it is further evidence of its distribution.
5
G.C.Macaulay, The Ancren Riwle, MLR, IX (1914). 6378; 145160; 324331; 463474, an
article which contains much useful matter, argues for the priority of the French version. His views
were partially answered by Dorothy M.E.Dymes, The Original Language of the Ancren Riwle, E&S,
IX (1924). 3149.
6
The earliest MS of the French text dates from the end of the thirteenth or the beginning of the
fourteenth century. The translation was probably made at about this time. On the French text in the
Trinity MS see the paper of Miss Hope Emily Allen in Essays and Studies in Honor of Carleton Brown
(1940), pp. 182219. On the early ownership of the English MSS the researches of Miss Allen will
throw much light. As yet her results are only partially available in her communication to the LTLS,
Feb. 8, 1936, supplementing her discussion in MLR, XXVIII (1933). 485487.
THE ANCRENE RIWLE
129
that it was so easily adapted later to the needs of men and the conditions of
monastic life.
What is it that distinguishes this book from other devotional treatises and
justifies the high position which it occupies in early English literature? It is in
the final analysis the personality of the author and the extent to which that
personality colors all his writing. His qualities of mind and temperament are
as attractive to us as they must have been to the three young women for
whom he wrote. There is, for example, his independence and remarkable
freedom from the conventional attitudes of the ordinary religious writer of
the Middle Ages. This independence is shown from the very beginning of his
book where he replies to a rather orthodox questionWhat rule should the
three sisters follow?in a very unorthodox way. He tells them that the
external rule that they follow is a very minor matter compared with the
inward rule which imposes on them genuine piety and obedience to the dictates
of their conscience. All may, he says, and ought to observe one rule
concerning purity of heart, that is, a clean unstained conscience But all
men cannot, nor need they, nor ought they to keep the outward rule in the
same unvaried manner. The external rule ordains fasting, watching,
enduring cold, wearing haircloth, and such other hardships as the flesh of
many can bear and many cannot. Wherefore, this rule may be changed and
varied according to every ones state and circumstances. For some are strong,
some are weak, and may very well be ex-cused, and please God with less;
some are learned, some are not, and must work the more, and say their
prayers at the stated hours in a different manner; some are old and ill-favored,
of whom there is less fear; some are young and lively, and have need to be
more on their guard. Every anchoress must, therefore, observe the outward
rule according to the advice of her confessor, and do obediently whatever he
enjoins and commands her, who knows her state and strength. He may modify
the outward rule, as prudence may direct, and as he sees that the inward rule
may thus be best kept. In like manner he says, If any ignorant person ask
you of what order you are, as ye tell me some do, who strain at the gnat and
swallow the fly, answer and say that ye are of the order of Saint James. This
is a very novel solution of their problem, for of course there was no order of
St. James, but St. James, as he says, defined pure religion as visiting and
assisting widows and fatherless children and keeping oneself pure and
unstained from the world. Herein is religion, and not in the wide hood, nor
in the black, nor in the white, nor in the gray cowl. This is hardly a position
which many in the Middle Ages would have dared to take and this independent
attitude runs all through the book.
Equally refreshing is a certain boldness of speech. His reference to the
anchoress who is old and ill-favored and who is therefore less likely to be
tempted will be recalled in the passage already quoted. There are many such
instances of candor. He tells his spiritual sisters that they shall take communion
only fifteen times a year because men esteem a thing as less dainty when
they have it often. In advising them to spend some of their time in reading,
The
Authors
Personality
His
Candor
130
Descriptive
and
Narrative
Gifts
he says, Often, dear sisters, ye ought to pray less, that ye may read more.
Reading is good prayer. Reading teacheth how, and for what, we ought to
pray. He is sometimes blunt. In recommending silence he contrasts Eves
willingness to carry on a conversation with the Devil with Marys modest
demeanor at the Annunciation, and he concludes, Do you, my dear sisters,
imitate Our Lady, and not the cackling Eve. He shows a wholesome disrespect
for the Devil, calls him the old ape and elsewhere says he is such an old
fool. Perhaps the most striking instances of his readiness to say what comes
to mind are his allusions to clerical lapses concerning which reticence was
more commonly the order of the daythat is, where we do not have to do
with the avowed satirist or reformer. In treating of confession he directs the
anchoress to be specific as to the person with whom she committed a sin.
Sir, it was with such a man; and then name hima monk, a priest, or clerk,
and of such an order, a married man, an innocent creature, a woman. There
is something startling about the order which he adopts in this enumeration.
At confession, he says, let there be a third person present. Some unhappy
creature, when she said that she was at confession, has confessed, herself
strangely. He can even become ironical on occasion about his professional
brethren. Bathsheba, by unclothing herself in Davids sight, caused him to
sin with her, though he was so holy a king and Gods prophet: and now, a
feeble man comes forward and esteems himself highly if he have a wide hood
and a close cope, and would see young anchoresses, and must needs look, as
if he were of stone, how their fairness pleases him, who have not their
complexion sunburnt, and saith that they may look confidently upon holy
men, yea, especially such as he is, because of his wide sleeves. We cannot
help being drawn to a man who is so free from restraint and whose honesty
gives him the courage to be so outspoken.
The authors knowledge of human nature is not the least of his qualifications
for writing such a book as he has written, and it results in a number of excursions
which anticipate the characters of Nicholas Breton and of Overbury.
The greedy glutton is the devils purveyor; for he always haunts the cellar or
the kitchen. His heart is in the dishes; all his thought is of the tablecloth; his
life is in the tun, his soul in the pitcher. He cometh into the presence of his
Lord besmutted and besmeared, with a dish in one hand, and a bowl in the
other. He talks much incoherently, and staggereth like a drunken man who
seemeth about to fall, looks at his great belly, and the devil laughs till he bursts.
His description of flatterers and his picture of the backbiter are masterly and
have often been quoted. Perhaps less familiar is his vignette of the ways of the
seducer:
No seduction is so perfidious as that which is in a plaintive strain; as if one
spoke thus: I would rather suffer death, than indulge an impure thought
with regard to you; but had I sworn it, I could not help loving you; and yet I
am grieved that you know it. But yet forgive me that I have told you of it;
THE ANCRENE RIWLE
131
and, though I should go mad, thou shalt never after this know how it is with
me. And she forgives him, because he speaks thus fair, and then they talk of
other matters. But the eye is ever towards the sheltering wood, wherein is
that I love. The heart is ever upon what was said before; and still, when he is
gone, she often revolves such words in her thoughts, when she ought to attend
diligently to something else. He afterwards seeketh an opportunity to break
his promise, and swears that necessity forces him to do it; and thus the evil
grows, the longer the worse; for no enmity is so bad as false friendship. An
enemy who seems a friend is of all traitors the most treacherous.
In a similar vein is his description of how the newly-wed husband breaks in a
wifein the medieval fashionbut there is not space for all the delightful
passages in a work from which there is so much one could quote.
No analysis of the qualities which stand out in the Ancrene Riwle and
make it so attractive would be adequate which did not lay particular stress
on the incidental features of its styleits proverbial quality, its bestiary
allusions, its familiar illustrations from everyday life, its homespun metaphors,
its humor. The author is very fond of proverbial wisdom. Thus often, as is
said, of little waxeth mickle; the dog enters gladly where he finds an open
door; the cock is brave on his own dunghill. He has a rich fund of animal
lore which he uses to point his moralthe pelican who pierces her own breast,
the eagle who deposits in his nest a precious stone which is called agate
and which keeps off poisonous things, the thievish fox and his cunning. Perhaps
his most attractive illustrations are drawn from his own observation of the
life about him. Reflect again thus: that if a child stumble against any thing,
or hurt himself, men beat the thing that he hurteth himself upon, and the
child is well pleased, and forgetteth all his hurt, and stoppeth his tears. In
another place he says, Our Lord, when He suffereth us to be tempted, playeth
with us, as the mother with her young darling: she flies from him, and hides
herself, and lets him sit alone, and look anxiously around, and call Dame!
dame! and weep a while, and then leapeth forth laughing, with outspread
arms, and embraceth and kisseth him, and wipeth his eyes. If all his
illustrations cannot have this same kind of charm, they nevertheless have the
appeal of homely and familiar things. A small patch may greatly disfigure a
whole garment. Our Lord doth to us as men do to a bad debtor; he accepteth
less than we owe him, and yet is well satisfied. When greedy dogs stand
before the board, is there not need of a rod? A man ties a knot upon his
belt, that he may be reminded of anything. Sometimes his figures have the
simple beauty of the Bible : All who are in heaven shall be as swift as mans
thought now is, and as the sunbeam that darts from east to west, and as the
eye openeth and shutteth. He has a beautiful symbol for the Crucifixion:
The true sun in the morning-tide ascended up on the high cross for the
purpose of diffusing the warm rays of his love over all. But with all the high
seriousness that is never absent from his purpose, he can be whimsical on
occasion, as when he remarks that confession erases sin and gives the Devil
His
Style
132
Book VIII
Identity
of the
Three
Sisters
less writing to do! And we could not miss the dry humor of a man who, in an
earnest warning against the temptations of the flesh, can say, The old woman
spoke very truly, when with a single straw all her house caught fire, that
much cometh of little.
The section which seems to have been least regarded in the Middle Ages
it is sometimes missing in the MSSis the eighth book. But to the modern
reader it often has the greatest appeal. It is the book in which the author
gathers together his instructions covering the sisters physical needs. It is here
that we catch a glimpse of the actual life of the anchoress. As we would
expect, he shows here the same moderation and the same liberal attitude in
matters of food and dress as he displays on spiritual issues, but he touches on
many details and these not only give the book its completeness but are the
chief reason that it interests so much the modern reader. The little things are
often the most interesting. Wear no iron, nor haircloth, nor hedgehogskins;do not with holly nor with briars cause yourselves to bleed without
leave of your confessor. In summer ye are at liberty to go and sit barefoot.
Ye shall eat no flesh nor lard except in great sicknessand accustom
yourselves to little drink. Nevertheless, dear sisters, your meat and your drink
have seemed to me less than I would have it. Fast no day upon bread and
water, except ye have leave. There are anchoresses who make their meals
with friends outside the convent. That is too much friendship, because, of all
orders, then is it most ungenial, and most contrary to the order of the
anchoress, who is quite dead to the world. We have often heard it said that
dead men speak with living men; but that they eat with living men, I have
never yet found. The anchoress must not make purses to give her friends, or
become a schoolmistress. She must not keep cattle. For then she must think
of the cows fodder, and of the herdsmans hire, flatter the hayward, defend
herself when her cattle is shut up in the pinfold, and moreover pay the damage.
Christ knoweth, it is an odious thing when people in the town complain of
anchoresses cattle. The behavior of the servants is considered at some length.
They should not munch fruit or anything else between meals. The one
who goes out on errands, let her be very plain, or of sufficient age. No
matter in this section is too small for his notice, and for this we can only
rejoice.
We may now ask when and by whom this remarkable book was written.
And the answer is not easy. Our earliest manuscripts of the work were written
when the first quarter of the thirteenth century was already past1230 is a
rough approximation to their date. But they are not the original; they are
copies in some cases two or more removes from the authors autograph.
How long before was the original written?
In 1918 Miss Hope Emily Allen, in an article of great importance,7
directed attention to the granting, sometime between 1127 and 1134, of
7
Hope Emily Allen, The Origin of the Ancren Riwle, PMLA, XXXIII (1918). 474546. See also
the same authors On the Author of the Ancren Riwle, PMLA, XLIV (1929). 635680.
THE ANCRENE RIWLE
133
Kilburn priory as a hermitage to tribus puellis, Emmae, videlicet, et Gunildae

et Cristinaei.e., to three unmarried women named Emma, Gunhilda, and
Christinaby the abbot and convent of Westminster. Kilburn priory was in
Hampstead, then about five miles outside of London and now a part of greater
London. A later tradition at Westminster tells us that the beneficiaries of the
grant had been maids-in-waiting (domicellae cameras) of Queen Maud, wife
of Henry I. Many of the circumstances of the three sisters in the Ancrene
Riwle fit the facts which can be learned about the Kilburn foundation. In a
subsequent paper8 Miss Allen proposed to identify the Emma, Gunhilda, and
Christina of the Kilburn grant with three daughters of a certain Deorman,
who gave lands, with the consent of their brother Ordgar, to Westminster
abbey on condition that they should enjoy the full society of the church.
The grant is allowed in a royal writ of Henry I. Their names are not mentioned
in the writ and their identity with the recluses rests merely upon what Miss
Allen calls the extreme rarity of medieval trios of devout, women.
If the double hypothesis here suggested should prove to be true, it would
clear up a number of questions. It would, of course, identify the three sisters
for whom the Ancrene Riwle was written. The Deormans were a prominent
and aristocratic Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Danish family. The Kilburn recluses
have English or Scandinavian names. If they were Deormans daughters and
were also the sisters of the Ancrene Riwle we could understand why this
work, composed for women of gentle or noble blood, should have been written
in English at a time when the language of the English court was French. And
it would strongly suggest that the author was Godwin, hermit of Kilburn,
who was the master in charge of the Kilburn recluses.
It must be admitted, however, that the acceptance of this very attractive
hypothesis presents certain difficulties. It would compel us to date the
Ancrene Riwle not later than c. 1140, and this is rather early. Certain parts
of Book VI seem to be based upon the Sententiae Exceptae of Geoffrey of
Auxerre, a work which must apparently be dated after 1153.9 If so, it is
hard to see how the three sisters of the Ancrene Riwle could have been
treated as still young at a date subsequent to this, if they had once been in
attendance upon Queen Maud, who died in 1118. A second objection is the
fact that the earliest associations of the Ancrene Riwle are with the west.
Practically all the earliest MSS are in the West Midland dialect and several
of them have been convincingly assigned to Hereford and Worcestershire,
the district with which the Katherine Group is associated on similar linguistic
grounds. When we consider the close association, in theme, manuscript
The Three Daughters of Deorman, PMLA, L (1935). 899902.

R.W.Chambers, Recent Research upon the Ancren Riwle, RES, I (1925). 423. Beatrice White,
The Date of the Ancrene Riwle, MLR, XL (1945). 206207, argues that the reference in Book VII to
Christ nailed to the Cross with one foot on top of the other suggests a date not earlier than 1200, and
Morton W.Bloomfield believes that the treatment of the Deadly Sins can hardly be earlier than the
beginning of the thirteenth century (The Seven Deadly Sins, East Lansing, 1952, p. 148).
9
Miss
Allens
Hypothesis: Its
Importance
Certain
Difficulties
134
The
Author
tradition,10 and allusion,11 of the Ancrene Riwle with the Katherine Group
one feels that any evidence that would place its composition in the
neighborhood of London, or indeed, anywhere but in the west, and at a date
far removed from 1200, must be very clear. The origin of the Ancrene Riwle
is admittedly still an open question.12
We are accordingly thrown back upon the text itself for our knowledge of
the author. From what has already been said and from many other indications
scattered through his work, it is apparent that he was a man of maturity,
both in judgment and in years. His position was such as to put him beyond
the fear of criticism or rebuke. He was probably no obscure priest. He was a
man of sound common sense, moderate and reasonable, never extreme in his
views or fanatical. His only obsession seems to have been his abhorrence and
fear of sensual indulgence. He was completely candid and free from any
trace of hypocrisy. Without being of the world, he was not remote from it or
ignorant of its ways. Above all, he was a kindly, benevolent spirit, one in
whom a genuinely large nature was united with a becoming modesty and
true simplicity of soul.13
10
All three MSS in which the pieces composing the Katherine Group are found also contain the
Ancrene Riwle.
11
The Ancrene Riwle alludes to the devil Ruffin, Belials brother, in our English book of St.
Margaret, and one can hardly doubt that this is the st. Margaret of the Katherine Group. The statement
Concerning those joys [of Heaven] ye have something written in another place looks like a reference
to Sawles Warde, another text of the Katherine Group although this cannot be proved.
12
No one is more open-minded about it than Miss Allen. A good bit of discussion has grown out of
her original paper. In addition to the articles cited in the preceding notes, a few further references may
be given. Vincent McNabb, The Authorship of the Ancren Riwle, MLR, XI (1916). 18; Further
Light on the Ancren Riwle MLR, XV (1920). 406409; H.E.Allen, The Ancren Riwle and Kilburn
Priory, MLR, XVI (1921). 316322; G.G. Coulton, The Authorship of Ancren Riwle, MLR, XVII
(1922). 6669; H.E.Allen, On the Author of the Ancren Riwle, PMLA, XLIV (1929). 635680;
J.R.R.Tolkien, Ancrene Wisse and Hali Meihad, E&S, XIV (1929). 104126. Father McNabbs
later articles have not added anything of significance to his previous arguments.
13
Four pieces of impassioned prose are found individually in MSS containing the Ancrene Riwle.
The finest of them, The Wooing of Our Lord, is in a MS which contains some of the Katherine Group
as well. It is a lyrical address to Christ in terms of passionate endearment, and may have been written
by a woman. Cf. E.Einenkel, Eine englische Schriftstellerin aus dem Anfange des 12. Jahrhunderts,
Anglia, V (1882). 265282, whose dating of the text is hardly consonant with his opinion that it was
written by one of the anchoresses of the Ancrene Riwle. Two of the other pieces, An Orison of Our
Lord and A Love song of Our Lord, express similar emotions. All contain at times phrases echoing
now the Ancrene Riwle, now Hali Meidenhad and St. Margaret. The fourth piece, A Lovesong of Our
Lady, addresses the Virgin in terms of equal affection. All four are printed in EETS. 34.
IV
Anglo-Norman Literature1
In an age when the song and recitation of the minstrel were the almost universal
entertainment of the upper classes at meals and in the evening and indeed at
all times when they could not find their recreation out of doors, literature
was well-nigh indispensable. Since, as we have already seen, the language of
the higher classes for more than two hundred years after the Norman Conquest
was either wholly or mainly French, any literature that would be intelligible
to them would have to be in that language. Naturally the whole body of
French literature was at their disposal, but a nation seldom remains for any
length of time solely dependent upon foreign sources even for its pleasure. It
is not surprising, therefore, to find early in the twelfth century French poets
in England, attracted no doubt by an aristocracy freely spending its newly
acquired wealth. During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries much that is
important in Old French literature was written in England. The dialect in
which it was written is known as Anglo-Norman, and this body of writings
as Anglo-Norman literature.
Patronage is the life blood of court poets. Where there is generous
patronage there is sure to be literature. The Conqueror himself is said to
have been indifferent to poets; he may well have been completely occupied
with the practical matters of conquest and administration. His successor,
William Rufus, was without soul or intellect. But with the accession in the
year 1100 of Henry I, the Conquerors youngest son, literary activity at the
court makes its appearance. It is probably not so much the result of his own
encouragementthe nickname Beauclerc, which he enjoyed, seems not to
have been wholly deservedas of the fact that he was twice married, both
times to women of literary tastes. His first wife Matilda (Queen Maud),
though English born, seems to have cultivated French poetry with
enthusiasm. The poet Guy of Amiens was her almoner. Her generosity
becoming universally known, says William of Malmesbury, crowds of
scholars, equally famed for verse and for singing, came over. Adelaide
1
For a readable and admirably clear survey of the more important writings in Anglo-Norman see
E.Walberg, Quelques aspects de la littrature anglo-normande (Paris, 1936); for a comprehensive list
of Anglo-Norman texts, with bibliographical annotations, J.Vising, Anglo-Norman Language &
Literature (London, 1923); and for a suggestive analysis of the Norman character, Gaston Paris, La
Littrature normande avant lannexion (Paris, 1899). Those who wish to savor the more important
Anglo-Norman texts mentioned in this chapter will often find selections in Paget Toynbee, Specimens
of Old French (Oxford, 1892), P. Studer and E. Waters, Historical French Reader (Oxford, 1924), and
in the Chrestomathies of Bartsch, Constans, etc. The publications of the Anglo-Norman Text Society
(since 1939) are making available a number of longer texts.
135
French
Literature
in England
Courtly
Patrons
136
Character
of AngloNorman
Literature
Philippe
de Than
of Louvain, Henrys second wife, whom he married in 1121, is even better

known as a patron. She had a poet named David who composed a rimed
history of her husbands achievements, which is lost. We know of it through
Gaimar, who boasts that he knew more tales than David ever knew or than
Adelaide had in books. For her Philippe de Than wrote his Bestiaire (infra)
and Benedeit his Voyage de St. Brendan (p. 139). Nor were Henrys queens
the only patrons of letters at his court. Gaimars Estorie des Engles is dedicated
to Custance la gentil, wife of Ralph Fitz Gilbert, while Samson de Nanteuil
translated the Proverbs of Solomon into French verse for Adelaide de Cond.
During the troubled years of Stephens reign and his contest with Matilda
poetry seems to have suffered a decline, although during this period Robert,
Earl of Gloucester, the natural son of Henry I and one of the greatest patrons
of letters in England, was generous in his encouragement of scholars and
literary men. With the accession of Henry II and his queen, the famous Eleanor
of Aquitaine, the English court became a veritable center of scholarly and
literary activity. Henry IIs own amazing energy was not confined to judicial
reform and administrative reorganization, for which history remembers him,
but extended over a wide range of intellectual interests. More than a score of
books bear dedications to him, from Adelard of Baths treatise On the
Astrolabe to the Lais of Marie de France.2 Eleanor is frequently mentioned in
the verses of the troubadours and it was to her that Wace presented his Roman
de Brut. It was under such auspices that Anglo-Norman literature had its
beginnings. Its continuation in the century that follows was made possible by
similar encouragement and support from the aristocratic classes.
The Norman temperament was essentially practical. Neither romantic
sentiment, nor mysticism, nor lyric cry have much part in the literature of
Normandy or Norman England. But curiosity, it would seem, needed
constantly to be gratified, and themes of a religious or moral nature are
very numerous and imply a wide appeal. Viewed as a whole, AngloNorman literature is prevailingly moral and edifying, and relatively poor
in works frankly romantic and fictional. This is well illustrated in the
poems of the earliest Anglo-Norman poet known to us, Philippe de Than.
His first work was a Comput (before 1120), a verse treatise on the calendar
and the ways of determining the movable festivals of the Church, to which
he added certain symbolical interpretations. His Bestiary is a type of poem
about which we shall have more to say later, in which highly fanciful
characteristics of animals are made the basis of a rather forced moral. He
2
C.H.Haskins, Henry II as a Patron of Literature, Essays in Medieval History presented to
Thomas Frederick Tout (Manchester, 1925), pp. 7177. On the reign of Henry II as an age of literary
activity see William Stubbs, Learning and Literature at the Court of Henry II, Seventeen Lectures on
Medieval and Modern History (3ed., Oxford, 1900), chs. VI and VII, and on the general subject of
patronage, Karl J.Holzknecht, Literary Patronage in the Middle Ages (Philadelphia, 1923). See also
Josiah C.Russell, The English Court as an Intellectual Center (11991227), in Three Short Studies
(Colorado Springs, 1927; Colorado College Pub., Gen. Ser. No. 148), pp. 6069. For Custance la
gentil and her husband see Alex. Bell, Gaimars Patron: Raul le fiz Gilebert, N&Q, 12 Ser., VIII.
104.
ANGLO-NORMAN LITERATURE
137
Composed also a Lapidary, if not several, dealing with the characteristics

and virtues of precious stones.3 There are numerous other lapidaries in AngloNorman,4 all of which go back to an eleventh-century Latin poem called De
Gemmis, by Marbode, Bishop of Rennes, which enjoyed an immense vogue
throughout the Middle Ages. Of similar didactic aim are the Distichs of Cato,
translated into Anglo-Norman no less than three times, and a rather uninspired
poem of 3000 lines called La Petite Philosophie,5 a compendium of geography
and cosmography.
There is a grain of truth in the statement that an uninteresting biography
has never been written, and the English court seems early to have been attracted
by this type of narrative. The lost poem of David on the achievements of
Henry I has already been mentioned. Although Henry II at times initiated
literary work, we may be quite sure he did not order the Vie de Saint Thomas
le Martyr,6 which was written shortly after the murder, by Garnier (more
properly Guernes), a clerk of Pont-Sainte-Maxence, who came to England in
1174 expressly to collect his material on the spot and finish his poem. About
1170 Denis Piramus composed La Vie Seint Edmund le Rei in more than
4000 lines of eight-syllable verse.7 At the time he was probably a monk of
Bury St. Edmunds, though his earlier life had been spent, as he tells us, amidst
the follies of the court, where he had written serventeis, chanceunettes, rimes,
saluz entre les drues e les drus. In the thirteenth century, at a date now
generally thought to be about 1250 or shortly thereafter a life of the famous
archbishop was written, apparently by no less a person than the celebrated
chronicler Matthew Paris.8 At approximately the same time (c. 1245) Henry
of Avranches wrote La Estorie de Seint Aedward le Rei in 4680 lines and
dedicated it to the Queen, for which (and a life of St. George) he received 10
from the Exchequer.9 The most remarkable of Anglo-Norman biographies is
the anonymous Histoire de Guillaume le Marchal,10 the celebrated Earl of
Pembroke, running to some 19,000 lines. It was written at the command of
the Earls son and is not only important for its historical accuracy but is
remarkable for its life-like picture and vivid narrative.
3
Philippe de Thans poems may be read in E.Mall, Li Cumpoz Philipe de Than (Strassburg,
1873), E.Walberg, Le Bestiaire de Philippe de Than (Lund, 1900), and Studer and Evans (as below),
pp. 201259.
4
Paul Studer and Joan Evans, Anglo-Norman Lapidaries. (Paris, 1924).
5
Wm. H.Trethewey, La Petite Philosophie, An Anglo-Norman Poem of the Thirteenth Century
(Oxford, 1939; Anglo-Norman Text Soc., No. 1).
6
Ed. E.Walberg (Lund, 1922; and again, 1936, in CFMA, 77). For another Anglo-Norman life of
Becket see La Vie de Thomas Becket par Beneit, pome anglo-normand du XIIe sicle, ed. Brje Schlyter
(Lund, 1941; tudes Romanes de Lund, IV).
7
The best edition is that of Hilding Kjellman (Gteborg, 1935).
8
A.T.Baker, La Vie de Saint Edmond, Romania, LV (1929). 332381. It was dedicated to
Isabelle of Arundel. The MS in which the life is found, the property of the Duke of Portland at Walbeck
Abbey, contains thirteen Anglo-French saints lives. For list, with the places where they have been
printed, see A.T.Baker in Romania, LXVI (1940). 49n.
9
Cf. J.C.Russell, MP, XXVIII (1931). 267. The text is in H.R.Luard, Lives of Edward the Confessor
(London, 1858; Rolls Series). For Henry of Avranches see below, p. 149.
10
Ed. Paul Meyer in the Socit de lhistoire de France (3V, Paris, 18911901); see also Meyers
discussion in Romania, XI (1882). 2274. On the subject of the poem see Sidney Painter, William
Marshall (Baltimore, 1933).
Religious
and
Secular
Biography
138
Historical
Themes
Gaimar
It was in works of history that Anglo-Norman writers scored their greatest

success, surpassing in both Latin and French the productions on the
Continent at the same period. It is not difficult to understand the popularity
of historical subjects at the English court. The conquerors had secured control
of a new country, and pride in their achievement stimulated a natural desire
to know more about the land over which they had become the rulers. Perhaps
they also enjoyed the feeling that this land had had as illustrious a past as
that of the kings of France and that their own record was worthy of regard.
At any rate it is the history of England and of Normandy, not of Europe or
antiquity, that they were interested in. About 1150 Geoffrey Gaimar,
attached in some way to Ralph Fitz Gilbert of Lincolnshire, wrote for dame
Custance, his wife, a verse chronicle in two parts. The first was an Histoire
des Bretons, that is, of the Celts in Britain, and was a working over in
French of Geoffrey of Monmouths Historia Regum Britanniae (see below,
p. 168). It is now lost and we know about it only from the opening lines of
the second part. This was the Estorie des Engles.11 It consists of some 6500
lines and except for about 800 lines at the beginning, which tell the story of
Havelok, later to be made the subject of an admirable English romance, it
is a history of the English based on the Old English Annals with a few
added episodes. Gaimar is not a gifted writer. His narrative, except on rather
rare occasions, does not rise above the factual and commonplace. When he
can escape from the impediments of fact and tell a story, as in the Havelok
and one or two other episodes, interest is better sustained. But he betrays
no marks of individuality, shows no prejudices, enthusiasms, or opinions.
He treats conqueror and conquered alike, so that we cannot tell whether
he was of Norman or Saxon descent. Most serious of all, he lacks the
imaginative eye for vivid detail which his contemporary Wace has, and
his work was valued only when it presented material not otherwise
available in French. This is doubtless the reason that in all manuscripts
Gaimars first part is replaced by Waces Roman de Brut, which covered
the same ground. 12 There were several other adaptations of Geoffrey
11
Ed. T.D.Hardy and C.T.Martin (2V, 188889; Rolls Ser.). For the Havelok episode see Alex. Bell,
Le Lai dHaveloc and Gaimars Haveloc Episode (Manchester, 1925; Pub. Univ. Manchester, French
Ser., IV). On Gaimar cf. Alex. Bell, Maistre Geffrei Gaimar, MA, VII (1938). 184198.
12
The Roman de Brut, since it occupies a place in the development of the Arthurian legend, will be
touched on in chapter VIII, below. Wace was a Norman, who spent his early life at Caen and his last
years as a prebendary of Bayeux; he does not belong, strictly speaking, to Anglo-Norman literature.
But his Roman de Brut, on the testimony of Layamon, was presented to Queen Eleanor, and his second
long poem, the Roman de Rou, a history of the dukes of Normandy, was begun about 1160 under the
patronage of Henry II. Unfortunately he was not allowed to finish this undertaking; for some reason
Henry replaced him, after he had written more than 11,000 lines, by a Maistre Beneeit, whom some
identify with Benot de Sainte-More. In addition to the two long poems just mentioned he wrote lives
in verse of St. Nicholas, St. George, and St. Margaret, and a poem of 1804 lines on La Conception
Nostre Dame. The last named enjoyed considerable popularity and found its way eventually into the
Cursor Mundi. Wace is thought to have died shortly after 1174, at the age of seventy or more. The
Roman de Rou is edited by H.Andresen (2V, Heilbronn, 187779). The latest edition of the Vie de
saint Nicholas is that of E.Ronsj (Lund, 1942; tudes romanes de Lund, V). For the Sainte Marguerite
see the edition of Eliz. A.Francis (Paris, 1932; CFMA, 71). The Saint George and the Conception are in
V.Luzarche, La Vie de la Vierge Marie (Tours, 1859).
139
of Monmouth in Anglo-Norman which need not be mentioned. Of more

importance is the fact that recent events were recorded in the same manner
as the older history. In 1173 Henrys sons, supported by the Scottish king,
revolted against their father. The following year Henrys forces took the
Scottish king prisoner in Northumberland and put an end to the revolt. The
events of this campaign were witnessed by Jordan Fantosme, who had been a
pupil in Paris of the celebrated Gilbert de la Pore and was later secretary to
Henry of Blois, Bishop of Winchester. His Chronicle of 2000 lines gives an
account, full of picturesque detail, of the events of this campaign. Slightly
later (c. 1225) we have an anonymous account, written in retrospect, of Henry
IIs conquest of Ireland. As late as the fourteeenth century verse history is still
occasionally written in French, although such matter is now more commonly
in prose. Peter Langtofts Chronicle13 covers the period from the destruction
of Troy to 1307 in 10,000 lines, and was early translated into English by
Robert of Brunne (cf. p. 204).
The body of Anglo-Norman religious literature of every sort is very large.
Mention has been made above of Samson de Nanteuils translation into
nearly 12,000 lines of verse of the Proverbs of Solomon (c. 1140). Early in
the twelfth century the Psalter was twice turned into French, as were other
parts of the Bible later in the century. At the end of the century a poet
named Chardry versified the legends of Barlaam and Josaphat and the Seven
Sleepers, and debated various moral questions in the Petit Plet, the three
making a total of more than 6500 lines.14 A great number of saints lives
appeared throughout the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. We have
mentioned for their biographical interest those of Edward the Confessor,
Thomas Becket, and Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury. Similar in
character but of special interest is the Voyage of St. Brendan15 (1121) by an
unknown Benedeit, mentioned above as one of the works dedicated to Queen
Adelaide. It tells the story, first found in the Latin Navigatio Sancti Brendani,
of an Irish abbot named Brendan and some monks who accompany him on
a quest in search of the other world. In the course of their seven-year journey
they witness many marvels and are eventually rewarded by a vision of paradise.
It is notable as the first introduction into popular literature in England of the
Celtic spirit of the marvelous.16 In the first half of the thirteenth cen tury, the
celebrated Bishop of Lincoln, Robert Grosseteste (d. 1253), wrote an
allegorical poem which he called Le Chteau dAmour 17 It ranges all
13
Edited by Thomas Wright (186668) for the Rolls Series.

All three were edited by John Koch in the Altfranzsische Bibliothek, Vol. I (Heilbronn, 1879).
Josophat, the son of a Hindu king, is converted to Christianity by the hermit Barlaam. The Seven
Sleepers is the story of seven youths who slept for 362 years and awoke in the reign of Theodosius.
15
E.G.R.Waters, The Anglo-Norman Voyage of St. Brendan by Benedeit (Oxford, 1928).
16
Cf. Walberg, Quelques aspects, p. 90.
17
Edited by J.Murray (Paris, 1918). For two Middle English translations see EETS, 98, pp 355
394 and 407442, and for the former of these the earlier editions of R.F.Weymouth (1864; Phihl. Soc.)
and J.O.Halliwell (1849). On the allegory of the castle in medieval literature see Roberta D.Cornelius,
The Figurative Castle (Bryn Mawr, 1930).
14
Religious
Subjects
Grosseteste
140
Robert of
Gretham
Peter of
Peckham
AngloNorman
Romances
the way from a debate of the Four Daughters of God,18 after which Christ
descends from Heaven into a castle which is the body of the Virgin Mary, to
a discussion of the attributes of Christ and His final judgment of the world,
distributing to each according to his deserts the joys of Heaven and the pains
of Hell.
Several works of great length and encyclopedic character, dating from the
middle of the thirteenth century, are still unedited. Robert of Grethams Miroir
or Les vangiles des Domnes19 (more than 20,000 lines) translates the Sunday
gospels with explanations of their meaning. The same author seems to have
written a second long poem called the Corset, a compendium of popular
theology. The poems are dedicated to an unidentified Alain and his wife, to
whom Robert served as chaplain. Of similar scope is the Lumire as Lais20
(14,000 lines) of Peter of Peckham, adapted in part from the Elucidarium of
Honorius of Autun (or Augustodunensis), and the Manual des Pchs21
(11,000 lines) by William of Wadington (?), which was translated into English
in Robert of Brunnes Handlyng Synne (cf. p. 204). Around the turn of the
fourteenth century Nicole Bozon, a Franciscan, composed a miscellaneous
collection of Contes Moraliss22 and wrote a number of other works in both
prose and verse, not all of which have been identified.23
Although religious literature and works intended to convey useful
knowledge constitute the largest part of Anglo-Norman literature, there is
also a fair number of pieces in which no other end is contemplated than enter
tainment. These are, as is to be expected, mostly romances, although some
18
The standard treatment of the allegory is Hope Traver, The Four Daughters of God (Philadelphia,
1907).
19
Unpublished, but there are considerable extracts in Marion Y.H.Aitken, tude sur le Miroir ou
les vangiles des domnes de Robert de Gretham (Paris, 1922).
20
This has not been printed; in one MS it is dated 1267. For an account of the author, MSS, sources,
etc., see M.Dominica Legge, Pierre de Peckham and His Lumiere as Lais, MLR, XXIV (1929). 3747;
153171. Peckham (the name occurs also as Pecchame and Feccham) is the author also of a Vie de Saint
Richard, written c. 1270 for the Countess of Arundel (ed. A.T.Baker, Revue des langues romanes, LIII
(1910). 245396), and Le Secr de Secrez (2383 lines), written sometime after the Lumire as Lais. It is
edited by Oliver A.Beckerlegge (Oxford, 1944; Anglo-Norman Text Soc., No, 5). The latter is a version
of the Secreta Secretorum, of which there were three in Anglo-Norman and several in Continental French.
For English versions see below, pp. 296 and 302 (Dicts and Sayings of the Philosophers).
21
This has been printed in somewhat incomplete form by F.J.Furnivall in his edition of the Handlyng
Synne (19013; EETS, 119 and 123). See E.J.Arnould, Le Manuel de Pchs: tude de littrature
religieuse anglo-normande (XII e sicle) (Paris, 1940), and D.W.Robertson, Jr., The Manuel de Pchs
and an English Episcopal Decree, MLN, LX (1945). 439447.
22
Edited by L.T.Smith and P.Meyer for the Socit des anciens textes franais (1889). For the
fullest treatment of Bozon see Hist. Litt., XXXVI. 400424, which should be supplemented by Sister
M, Amelia, Nicholas Bozon, Speculum, XV (1940). 444453, and the important Introduction to
Johan Vising, Deux pomes de Nicholas Bozon (Gteborg, 1919). Vising has also edited La Plainte
dAmour (Gteborg, 19057), probably by Bozon. A.C.Thorn has edited Les Proverbes de bon
enseignement (Lund, 1921; Lunds Univ. rsskrift, N.F., Avd. 1, Bd. 17, Nr. 4; another text, from the
Vernon MS, is in EETS, 117, pp. 522553) and Mary R. Learned has edited Saints Lives Attributed
to Nicholas Bozon, Franciscan Stud., XXV (1944). 7988, 171178, 267271.
23
It should be mentioned here, that the religious drama is represented by the twelfth-century AngloNorman Adam (see p. 276), a Resurrection of the early thirteenth century (ed Jean G.Wright for
CFMA in 1931), and a recently discovered text (see T.A.Jenkins and J.M.Manly, La Seinte
Resureccion, Oxford, 1943; Anglo-Norman Text Soc., IV).
141
fabliaux and an occasional satirical piece like Le Jongleur dEly give us a

welcome glimpse of the English court in its lighter moments. Mention has
been made above of the nearly 800 lines devoted to the story of Havelok the
Dane at the beginning of Gaimars Estorie des Engles. The same story in
slightly longer form is told separately as a lay by an anonymous poet writing
about 113040. It shows us the interest which the ruling class took in whatever
was thought to concern the earlier history of the island, whether English,
Danish, or Celtic. Among several other Anglo-Norman lays, Amis and
Amiloun enjoyed perhaps the greatest popularity in the Middle Ages as a
story of friendship put to a very great test. It should be remembered that the
supreme author of such short romantic poems, Marie de France, lived at the
English court and translated another of her works, a collection of fables,
from English, as she herself tells us. The earliest and most famous and in
some ways the best of the longer French romances written in England is the
Tristan of Thomas, composed about 1170. It is one of the two earliest
representatives of the lost French romance from which all subsequent
treatments of the Tristan and Iseult story in literature descend. Sometime
before the end of the century another Anglo-Frenchman, Robert de Boron,24
wrote at least two romances on Arthurian themes, Joseph dArimathie or
the Estoire du Graal, which in the four thousand lines that are preserved
tells the story of the origin of the Holy Grail, and Merlin, of which only
400 lines have come down to us. About 1180 another poet named Thomas,
who cannot be identified with the author of the Tristan, told the story of
Horn, better known to modern readers in the English romance King Horn
(cf. p. 175). Two long romances on pseudo-classical themes are the work of
Hugh of Rutland. One, Ipomedon (c. 1185), resembles the story of Guy of
Warwick in the heros efforts to prove himself worthy of the lady he loves.
The other, Protheselaus (c. 1190), relates the quarrel of two brothers, sons
of Ipomedon, and their subsequent reconciliation. Each of these romances
is more than 10,000 lines long. Of similar length and approximately the
same date is Thomas of Kents Roman de Toute Chevalerie, a story of
Alexander the Great, while the longest of all the Anglo-Norman romances,
the anonymous Waldef (22,000 lines) of the end of the twelfth century,
relates the tragic struggle of an English king to regain his throne, and the
avenging of his death by his sons.25 Both the Roman de Toute Chevalerie
and the Waldef still remain in manuscript. A romance of Fouke Fitz Warin
in verse exists only in a later prose redaction.26 It would seem that the
writing of romances in French died out in England with the spread of English
to the upper classes in the thirteenth century. Two, however, were produced
in the first half of the century on subjects which were destined to enjoy
24
There are those who believe that he was not an Englishman. See the discussion of W.A. Nitze in
the Manly Anniversary Studies (Chicago, 1923), pp. 300314. For a more acceptable position see the
same authors The Home of Robert de Boron, MP, XL (1942).113116.
25
The Latin Waldef has been edited by R.Imelmann, Johannes Bramis Historia Regis Waldei (Bonn,
1912; Banner Studien, IV).
26
The prose version is edited by Louis Brandin (Paris, 1930; CFMA, 63).
142
the greatest popularity when they were later treated in EnglishGui de

Warewic and Boeve de Haumtone. Some others probably once existed but
are now lost, such as a Richard Cur de Lion which is several times referred
to in the English romance of that name.27
Anglo-Norman literature had passed its crest by about 1250,28 although
in diminishing amounts works in French continued to be written in England
until the end of the fourteenth century. Even John Gower, who holds a modest
but respectable place in English poetry, could write as late as 1376 one of his
long poems, the Mirour de lOmme (30,000 lines), in French.29 Slightly more
than four hundred texts, ranging from short lyrics to pieces of staggering
length, are known today and testify to the place which French once held in
the culture of the English upper classes.
27
The romances mentioned in this paragraph will be found in the following editions: E. Klbing,
Amis and Amiloun (Heilbronn, 1884); J.Bdier, Le Roman de Tristan par Thomas (2v, Paris, 19035;
SATF); for an English translation see R.S.Loomis, The Romance of Tristram and Ysolt by Thomas of
Britain (1931); W.A.Nitze, Robert de Boron: Le Roman de lEstoire dou Graal (Paris, 1927; CFMA,
57), containing also the fragment of the Merlin; earlier edition by F.Michel (Bordeaux, 1841); R.Brede
and E.M.Stengel, Das anglonormannische Lied vom wackern Ritter Horn (Marburg, 1883; Ausgaben
und Abhandlungen, VIII); E.Klbing and E.Koschwitz, Ipomedon (Breslau, 1889); F.Kluckow, Hue de
Rotelande: Protheselaus (Gttingen, 1924); A.Ewert, Guide Warewic (2v, Paris, 19323; CFMA, 74
75; A. Summing, Der anglonormannische Boeve de Haumtone (Halle, 1899).
28
Walter of Bibbesworth, the author of two whimsical poems, is the author of a famous Trait
(124050) written to teach French to the children of Dionysia de Munchensy. On the poems (now BM
Add. MS 46919, formerly Phillipps MS 8336) see Miss Legges Anglo-Norman Literature, pp. 3489,
on the Trait Alexander Bell, Notes on Walter de Bibbesworths Treatise, PQ, XLI (1962). 361
372, and Albert C.Baugh, The Date of Walter of Bibbesworths Trait, Festschrift fr Walther Fischer
(Heidelberg, 1959), pp. 2133.
29
A list of books owned by Richard II contains mostly romances in French. Cf. Edith Rickert,
King Richard IIs Books, Library, n. s. XIII (1932). 144147.
V
Early Latin Writers
In any age up to the Renaissance, the Latin literature of Europe is the measure
of its intellectual life. In a day when all books which made a pretense to
learning were written in Latin, such books are a barometer recording by
their number and importance the advances, the retrogressions, or the periods
of hesitation in European civilization. But while Latin is the language of
learning, not all books written in it are necessarily learned. Learned men
have their moments of leisure. All through the Middle Ages important positions
in the government and at court were filled by bishops and clerks trained for
the church, men whose progress through the schools or the university had by
a process of natural selection marked them as possessed of the intellectual
grasp and learning needed in dealing with the problems of government and
the State. Such men, though churchmen, were more occupied with worldly
than religious matters and in some cases their natural inclinations were
anything but pious. It would be a mistake to think that their readingdone
in Latin with the ease that comes of long habitwas exclusively edifying.
Hence such Latin books as the De Nugis Curialium, the Speculum Stultorum,
the Otia Imperialia, and the mass of light, satirical, and scurrilous verse that
we know as Goliardic poetry.
Since the Latin language was international, the Latin writings of any
particular country are also a measure of the extent to which that country
participates in the general progress that is being made. There was a time, in
the eighth century, when England led the world in learning, when at the
beginning Bede was writing and at the end Charlemagne was forced to
bring Alcuin from York to direct the intellectual reforms which he was bent
on in France. And there was also a time a century later when King Alfred
could lament that there were very few on this side of the H umber who
couldtranslate a letter from Latin into English. Fortunately the
Benedictine Reform1 and the Norman Conquest had brought improvement.
However limited were the Conquerors own bookish interests, he had a
respect for learning and filled the English churches and monasteries with
learned bishops and abbots and monks. As a result, a generation later
England was ready to participate in the general awakening that was taking
place in Europe. The twelfth century is one of those periods in history in
which many things have their beginnings and in which there is both
substantial achievement and promise of greater achievement to come. It was
1
See above, p. 100.
143
A
Measure of
Intellectual
Life
TwelfthCentury
Renaissance
144
John of
Salisbury
The
Policraticus
the century in which the great cathedrals of Europe were begun. It was the
century of the troubadours and of Chrtien de Troyes. It witnessed the rapid
development of scholastic philosophy with William of Champeaux, Abelard,
and Peter Lombard, preparing the way for the great Schoolmen of the
thirteenth century, Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, and Duns Scotus.
And it saw the founding of the universities, above all of Paris, but also of
Bologna and Oxford and, towards the end of the century, Cambridge. What
the University of Paris alone meant to the intellectual life of the Middle Ages
can hardly be estimated. Everywhere there are signs of quickened intellect
and new life. It is not without reason that we have come to speak of a TwelfthCentury Renaissance,2 and in the Latin literature and learning of this century
England has a full share.
From the large number of Latin writers of England in the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries a few names stand out in bold relief. Of these the earliest
is that of John of Salisbury. His experience is typical of many for whom a
career in the Church was equivalent to a position in public life, whether assumed
willingly or, as in his case, against inclination. He was born about 1120, and
studied for twelve years in Paris and at Chartres under such teachers as Abelard
and William of Conches. Chartres was a center of literary and humanistic
studies, and John of Salisbury owes his wide acquaintance with classical poets
to the tradition which the famous Bernard established there. On his return to
England in 1154, after some years in the service of the Pope, he became secretary
to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Theobald, and later held the same office
under Becket, whose cause he supported and whose exile he shared. The last
four years of his life he spent as Bishop of Chartres, where he died in 1180.
His two principal works are the Policraticus and the Metalogicon,3 both finished
in 1159 and dedicated to Thomas Becket, then chancellor to Henry II. The
latter is a defense of logic and apart from an interesting section on the authors
student years in France is of value chiefly for its account of scholastic studies
in his day. The Policraticus is of wider interest.
The Policraticus (Statesmans Book), whether conceived as a whole from
the beginning or growing under the authors hand, is the embodiment of a
large purpose which must have been in his mind whether he had formulated
it consciously or not. For the work is nothing less than a treatise on the good
life, which, since we live in an organized society, involves a consideration of
the welfare of the State. With all its essay-like informality in the individual
chapters, it hangs together in a fairly logical way. While John addresses
2
C.H.Haskins, The Renaissance of the Twelfth Century (Cambridge, Mass., 1927); G.M.Par, et.
al., La Renaissance du XII e sicle: les coles et lenseignement (Paris, 1933).
3
Critical editions of the Policraticus and the Metalogicon have been published by C.C.J. Webb
(Oxford, 1909 and 1929). The Policraticus can now all be read in translation, part of it in John
Dickinson, The Statesmans Book of John of Salisbury (1927), the remainder in Joseph B.Pike, Frivolities
of Courtiers and Footprints of Philosophers (Minneapolis, 1938). C.C.J.Webbs John of Salisbury
(1932) is popular but authoritative. Good brief accounts will be found in Helen Waddell, John of
Salisbury, E&S, XIII (1928). 2851, and R.L.Poole, Illustrations of Medieval Thought (2ed., 1920),
ch. VII.
EARLY LATIN WRITERS
145
himself to the chancellor of England, he has in mind the whole governing

class as well as that intangible entity, posterity. He begins by attempting to
clear away the habits and practices which he considers unworthy, or foolish,
or actually immoral, and which are not always recognized as such, particularly
when they occur where they do the most harmat the court and in high
places. And so he condemns hunting, gaming, actors and mimics, magic and
astrology, and the things inimical to the public welfarepride, concupiscence,
flattery, especially as a vicious means of advancement. All this occupies the
first three books. In the next three he considers the proper functioning of the
Statethe character and conduct of the prince and his relation to the law,
the commonwealth and its members, the administration of justice, the behavior
of its armed forces, the cohesion of its parts. And in the concluding books he
turns successively to the things which his own studies have shown to be
important, first to the intellectual and ethical principles which have in view
the health of body and soul, and hence to the efforts of philosophers to
attain wisdom and truth; and lastly to those private virtues on which all
happiness ultimately dependsmodesty, moderation, sobriety, and the like
all of which leads to the conclusion that the happy man is he who fears God
and frames his life accordingly. There are sometimes long digressions which
tend to obscure the plan, but it is impossible not to sense the larger purpose
which throughout animates this really lengthy work.
John of Salisbury is not a profound or original thinker, a philosopher who
builds a new system or tears down old ones. He is content not to be dogmatic
on matters about which a wise man may well confess doubt, and he specifically
disclaims originality. But he expresses his convictions boldly, even to justifying
the putting to death of tyrants, and he quotes a conversation which he had
with Pope Adrian IV in which he assuredly did not mince words on the
corruption of Rome and the papal court. His weakness is the result of the
very circumstance to which he owes much of his strengththe twelve years
which he spent in study at Paris and Chartres. He has read everything and he
quotes endlesslyHorace and Virgil, Juvenal, Ovid, Terence, and the whole
range of Latin writers, pagan and Christian, until at times present reality is
lost in the wealth of historical example. There is enough of himself on every
page, however, to dominate the thought, so that interest does not flag. Student
and moralist, he has been forced to spend his life with kings and chancellors,
archbishops and popes. He has seen the shortcomings not so much of Church
and State as of prelates and statesmen, and being a man of convictions he
sets down his philosophy of life for the benefit of those among whom it may
do some good.
Walter Map (c. 1140c. 1209) needed a Boswell. Like Johnson he was a
greater talker than writer; he was noted for his witty conversation and his
good stories. His life would have made a fascinating biography, beginning
with his student years in Paris and continuing with his experiences as a clerk
in the kings household and as an itinerant justice, and ending with his death
as Archdeacon of Oxford. He was a favorite of Henry II, traveled with him,
His
Character
Walter
Map
146
met scores of interesting people, and saw Rome as a delegate to the third
Lateran Council. He passed in the Middle Ages as the author of some of the
most famous of the Goliardic poems; he may have written verses of this sort
in his early days. A persistent and early tradition credits him with the
authorship of the prose Lancelot and other Arthurian romances, a tradition
that cannot be accepted in any literal sense. His one extant book, De Nugis
Curialium4 (Courtiers Trifles), passed completely unnoticed in the Middle
Ages and survives in a single manuscript copied two hundred years after it
was written. It is a collection of stories, historical anecdotes, scraps of folklore,
witty remarks and amusing incidents, occasionally bits of satire and
denunciation, without order or plan, written down between 1181 and 1193.5
A somewhat comparable book is the Otia Imperialia of Gervase of Tilbury,
Gervase of who chose England for his birth and death but lived most of his life abroad.
Tilbury
It is a veritable Book of Knowledge into which the author put all the interesting
things he knew about the earth and its history, with a collection of wonders
thrown in for good measure. It was written in 1211 for the entertainment
and (we may suspect) the edification of the Emperor Otto IV.
Giraldus
Another interesting personality of Henry IIs reign, Giraldus Cambrensis,6
Cambrensis was like his friend Walter Map a Welshman and a cleric, but there the
resemblance ends. For whereas Map was possessed of an amiable indolence
and acquired numerous preferments, Giraldus had the zeal of a reformer,
loved a fight, and was always willing to excommunicate his opponent. He
spent the best years of his life in an unsuccessful effort to become Bishop
of St. Davids and raise the see to metropolitan rank in Wales, the equal
of Canterbury and York. He is commonly classed as an historian and
indeed he wrote a Topography of Ireland, the Conquest of Ireland, an
Itinerary of Wales, based on his journey through Wales with Archbishop
Baldwin to preach the Third Crusade, a Description of Wales,7 and other
more strictly historical works. For he was a voluminous writer, whose
extant writings fill eight volumes in the Rolls Series. But among them are
a number of pieces of a more general character, including two which are in the
4
Edited by M.R.James (Oxford, 1914) and earlier by Thomas Wright for the Camden Soc. (1850);
trans. by F.Tupper and M.B.Ogle (1924) and by M.R.James (1923; Cymmrodorion Record Ser., No.
IX).
5
James Hinton, Walter Maps De Nugis Curialium: Its Plan and Composition, PMLA, XXXII
(1917). 81132.
6
Also known as Gerald de Barri. His dates are c. 11461220. He spent, as he tells us himself, three
periods of several years in study at Paris and shows wide acquaintance with classical literature. He
served as archdeacon of Mynyw (St. Davids) and in other ecclesiastical capacities. He was elected
Bishop of St. Davids in 1198, but in spite of three trips to Rome could not overcome the influence of
the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Kings natural fears. The election was not confirmed, and he
retired gracefully from the field. For an excellent treatment of Gerald see the lecture of F.M.Powicke,
Gerald of Wales, Bull. John Rylands Library, XII (1928). 389410, reprinted in Christian Life in the
Middle Ages and Other Essays (Oxford, 1935).
7
A translation of these four works is in the Bohn library, The Historical Works of Giraldus
Cambrensis, ed. Thomas Wright, and the two on Wales are available in the Everymans Library.
EARLY LATIN WRITERS
147
nature of an autobiography,8 and even in the works which have an importance

for the historian there is so much incidental anecdote and observation, popular
tradition, legend, and folklore that they have considerable appeal to the general
reader. His narrative is always swift and vigorous, full of the unexpected,
lively, never hampered by moderation or restraint. Even his outrageous egotism
is so frank as to disarm criticism.
The name of one other Welshman should be found with those of Walter
Map and Giraldus Cambrensis in this place, that of Geoffrey of Monmouth.
But since his History of the Kings of Britain (1137) and his verse life of
Merlin (Vita Merlini) owe their interest chiefly to their connection with
Arthurian romance, consideration of them will be postponed until chapter
VIII, where they may be given their proper place in the development of the
Arthurian legend.
We have already seen in the preceding chapter how widespread was the
interest in history among the new rulers of England after the Norman Conquest
and how that interest was satisfied by Anglo-Norman poets for those who
could not read Latin. The same interest gives us a long series of chronicles
and histories in Latin unequaled in any other country of Europe. We cannot
speak here of the many monastic annals compiled at religious houses and
concerned mainly with local affairs. These belong with a few notable
exceptions to the middle and south of England and tend to disappear after
1300. The more ambitious chronicle commonly begins with the Anglo-Saxons,
or at times with the creation of the world, and comes down to the writers
own day. Thus Simeon of Durham9 covers the period from 616 to 1130, and
Florence of Worcester, whose Chronicon ex Chronicis is a rather bare record
of events, begins with the time of Julius Caesar and continues to within a
year or so of his own death in 1118. Ordericus Vitalis, the son of a Norman
father and an English mother, compiled between 1130 and 1141 an Historia
Ecclesiastica from Creation to the time of writing, an interesting and valuable
source for the period beginning with the Norman Conquest. Two writers
stand out for their literary interest. William of Malmesbury, whose Gesta
Regum Anglorum (4491128) is the most ambitious of his several
undertakings, treats the writing of history as an art. He is careful to
differentiate his work from that of the mere chronicler, and justifies an
occasional digression on the score of variety and interest. Henry of
Huntingdon, whose value to the historian is rather slight, inserts in the form of
8
De Rebus a se Gestis and De Jure et Statu Meneuensis Ecclesiae (Vols. I and in of the edition in
the Rolls Series). These have been translated by H.E.Butler, The Autobiography of Giraldus Cambrensis
(1937), except for a portion of the latter which has no autobiographical interest. The Speculum Ecclcsiae,
one of the pieces of more general character referred to in the text, has not been translated. It is a
collection of satirical and often scurrilous sketches of unworthy clerics.
9
All of the works mentioned will be found edited in the Rolls Series. For a full list of the English
chroniclers and an appraisal of their historical importance see Charles Gross, Sources and Literature
of English Historyto1485 (2ed., 1915), PP. 326399. English translations of the more important
are included in the Bohn Library, the Church Historians of England, the Everymans Library, etc. On
the origins of the medieval chronicle see R.L.Poole, Chronicles and Annals: A Brief Outline of Their
Origin and Growth (1926).
Geoffrey
of
Monmouth
Chroniclers
148
St. Albans
Matthew
Paris
Jocelyn de
Brakelond
Latin translation many ballads and popular traditions which he heard among
the people, and these do much to make up for his rather brief and matter-offact style. Of special importance for the reign of Henry II are William of
Newburghs Historia Rerum Anglicarum (to 1197), the work of a careful
student with many of the ideals of the modern scholar, the Gesta Regis Henrici
Secundi ascribed to Benedict of Peterborough and possibly the work of Richard
Fitz-Neal, author of the famous Dialogus de Scaccario (Dialogue of the
Exchequer), and the Chronica of Roger Hoveden whose work is of greatest
value for the closing decade of the twelfth century. It may be said of all these
writers that for the past they merely compile or slavishly copy from earlier
sources and that they become interesting and assume importance when they
reach the period of which they have personal knowledge.
In the thirteenth century one school of historians stands out above all
others, the chroniclers who wrote at the great monastery of St. Albans. Situated
only twenty miles from London on one of the main highways, the abbey was
a convenient stopping place for travelers the first night out of the city, and
frequently had as guests the king and other magnates of the realm. In the
days when most current events were known by direct report this gave the
abbey a unique advantage in the gathering of historical material. The greatest
of the St. Albans chroniclers was Matthew Paris, who seems to have been as
gifted as an illuminator and worker in gold and silver as he was as an historian.
His principal work, the Chronica Majora, 10 incorporates that of his
predecessors John of Cella and Roger of Wendover and continues to the year
1259. It is a vivid and colorful narrative. His history was continued by a
fellow monk, William Rishanger (to 1306), and by others down to Thomas
Walsingham, who closes the series in 1422. In the first half of the fourteenth
century a monk of Chester abbey, Ranulf Higden, compiled a universal history
called the Polychronicon, extending from the beginning of the world to 1327,
which was continued by others to 1357 and enjoyed an enormous popularity
in the century following. It would not be possible to omit mention of the
Chronicle of Jocelyn de Brakelond,11 though it is not a chronicle in the
usual sense. It is really a life of the abbot Samson and an account of his
efforts to restore discipline and a business-like conduct of affairs in the great
Benedictine monastery of Bury St. Edmunds. It is charming in its frankness,
sincerity, and occasional touches of shrewd humor. Its picture of laxity, petty
politics, the self-seeking of unscrupulous monks, and the sympathetic portrait
of abbot Samson leave with one an indelible impression of what sometimes
went on in a great monastic house. The story is familiar to all readers of
Carlyles Past and Present.
10
Edited in the Rolls Series (187283). His Historia Minor is an abridgment with additions (1067
1253). He is also the author of Vitae Abbatum S.Albani, various saints lives, etc.
11
Edited by J.G.Rokewode (1840; Camden Soc., Vol. 13). It may be read in English in the translation
of L.C.Jane The Chronicle of Jocelin of Brakelond (1907). It was written in 1202 and covers the years
11731202.
EARLY LATIN WRITERS
149
In the Latin literature of England in the Middle Ages the prose is of much
greater significance than the verse. Nevertheless a good bit of verse was written,
ranging from the serious epic to the light, the satirical, and at times the highly
indecorous. Joseph of Exeter, who accompanied Archbishop Baldwin on the
Third Crusade,12 composed an epic in six books known as the De Bello Trojano
(c. 1184) in the manner of Virgil. It is a more than respectable performance,
but unfortunately, so far as modern readers are concerned, has run into fatal
competition since the Renaissance with a certain Greek poem. If Joseph of
Exeter falls somewhat short of his model, Virgil, it is a still farther cry from
Horace to the Nova Poetria13 of Geoffrey de Vinsauf, an interesting mixture
of classical precept and medieval practice. A delightfully amusing satire on
ambitious monks is Nigel Wirekers Speculum Stultorum14 (c. 1180), a mirror
in which fools may see themselves as the ass Burnellus, who thought his tail
was too short. His adventures with the doctors of Salerno, his years of study
at the University of Paris, at the end of which he is still only able to say ya, his
determination to found a new kind of monastery where every monk may
have a mistress, are related with much more than mere humor. Finally, there
is the large body of strongly rhythmical verse, by turns trivial, amorous,
scurrilous, and coarse, written by university students sowing their wild oats
or by scholares vagantes who have quit the academic life permanently or
temporarily and taken to the road. Although we must discard the attribution
of much of this verse to Walter Map, Englishmen seem to have had a share in
its production.15 It is the poetry of the bohemian life and the tavern. It shows
no respect for rank or authority, makes light of death, has no concern for the
future either in this world or the next. It is the flaunted gaiety of the socially
declassed, the voice of defiant nonchalance in rags.
12
He celebrated the expedition in a Latin poem called the Antiocheis, of which only a few lines
remain.
13
Text in E.Faral, Les Arts potiques du XIIe et du XIII sicle (1923).
14
In Thomas Wright, Anglo-Latin Satirical Poets (2V, 1872; Rolls Ser.). On Wireker see the articles
of John H.Mozley: On the Text of the Speculum Stultorum Speculum, IV (1929). 430442; V (1930).
251263; The Unprinted Poems of Nigel Wireker, Speculum. VII (1932). 398423; Nigel Wireker
or Wetekre, MLR, XXVII (1932). 314317. As an example of the occasional poet, who in this case
was not English but spent a number of years in England and wrote much for English patrons, see
J.C.Russell, Master Henry of Avranches as an International Poet, Speculum, III (1928). 3463. For
the large body of Latin political verse consult the collections of Thomas Wright noted on p. 222.
15
Such verse is known as Goliardic poetry from the fact that a certain Golias, called episcopus or
pontifex, who has numerous children or disciples, is frequently mentioned as the author and progenitor
of it. The authorship of some of the poems is concealed under the names Primas and Archipoeta. An
Englishman credited with others, Serlo of Wilton, is mentioned among the acquaintances of both Walter
Map and Giraldus Cambrensis. A number of texts are printed in Thomas Wright, The Latin Poems
Commonly Attributed to Walter Mapes (1841; Camden Soc., Vol. 16). Further references will be found,
together with a valuable introduction summarizing the results of modern scholarship, in Olga DobiacheRojdestvensky, Les Posies des goliards (1931). See also Helen Waddell, The Wandering Scholars (1927),
P.S.Allen, The Romanesque Lyric (1928), the same authors Medieval Latin Lyrics (1931), and
F.J.E.Raby, A History of Secular Latin Poetry (2V, Oxford, 1934). Howard Mumford Jones contributed
translations to Allens earlier volume; other translations will be found in John Addington Symonds,
Wine, Women, and Song: Medieval Latin Students Songs (1884) and Helen Waddell. Medival Lyrics
(1929).
Latin
Verse
Goliardic
Verse
150
Variety of
the Latin
Literature
Space forbids the proper consideration of much more that is important in

the Latin literature of England. We can only hint at its variety. Scientific
interests are represented by Alexander Neckham (11571217), whose De
Naturis Rerum,16 like Bartholomew Anglicuss De Proprietatibus Rerum (c.
123050), ranges over the whole field of physical and natural science. Not
content with Western scholarship, Adelard of Bath17 traveled to Greece and
Asia Minor in search of Arabic learning, and Daniel Morley went from Paris
to Toledo gathering Arabic teachings on earthly and heavenly bodies (De
Naturis Inferior um et Superiorum). One of the greatest of medieval scientists,
Roger Bacon (c. 12141294), who is also one of the few Englishmen who
knew Greek in his century, covered in his Opus Majus not only mathematics
and the sciences, but grammar, logic, and moral philosophy, experimenting
with the microscope and pointing the way to the inductive methods of modern
research.18
In the Middle Ages as now, each man wrote about the thing that interested
him. Ralph de Glanville, appointed Chief Justiciar of England in 1180,
produced a treatise invaluable for the historian, De Legibus et Consuetudinibus
Regni Angliae. Osbern (fl., 1090), a monk of Christ Church, Canterbury,
was given to translating saints lives from Old English. Ailred of Rievaulx (c.
11091166), abbot of the Cistercian monastery of that name in Yorkshire,
composed a rule for recluses and a number of works on religious and historical
subjects. The great Bishop of Lincoln, Robert Grosseteste (c. 11751253)
translated Aristotles Ethics and wrote so extensively on science, mathematics,
religion, etc. that the list of his works fills twenty-five closely printed pages.19
An Englishman of the thirteenth century is supposed to have compiled that
widespread collection of stories with a moral, the Gesta Romanorum,20 at
the same time that Odo of Cheriton (1247) was producing his Latin fables
and his sermons on the Sunday gospels. In the fourteenth century Richard of
Bury, Bishop of Durham (12871345), an indefatigable if sometimes
unscrupulous book collector, expressed his love of books in a delightful treatise,
the Philobiblon.21 And, lest the preachers should be entirely neglected, room
may be found for the mention of the Summa Praedicantium of John Bromyard
(c. 1390), full of good stories and apposite illustrations.
16
Edited by Thomas Wright for the Rolls Series (1863). On the general subject of medieval science
see Lynn Thorndike, A History of Magic and Experimental Science (6V, 192341), and C.H.Haskins,
Studies in the History of Medivel Science (Cambridge, Mass., 1924).
17
His De Eodem et Diverse was written about 1116. His other writings include Questiones Naturales
and treatises on the abacus and the astrolabe.
18
The Opus Majus has been translated by Robert B.Burke (2v, Philadelphia, 1928). His other
writings include the Opus Minus, Opus Tertium, a Compendium Philosophiae, a Greek grammar,
works on alchemy, etc.
19
See F.S.Stevenson, Robert Grosseteste (1899) and S.Harrison Thomson, The Writings of Robert
Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, 12351253 (Cambridge, 1940).
20
An English translation is available in the Bohn Library (1877).
21
Text and translation by E.C.Thomas (1888); translation separately (1902) in the Kings Classics
and now in the Medieval Library. In a number of MSS the work is attributed to Thomas HolkoL
EARLY LATIN WRITERS
151
An adequate survey of the medieval Latin literature of England would

require a large volume. It is the purpose of the present chapter merely to
suggest its wealth and variety and thus reveal the more intellectual side of
English culture in the Middle Ages.22
22
The student who wishes to pursue the subject further may consult the monumental work of Max
Manitius, Geschichte der lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters (3V, 191131), which unfortunately
only reaches to the end of the twelfth century; Adolf Ebert, Histoire gnrale de la littrature du
moyen ge en occident, trans. by J.Aymeric and J.Condamin (3V, 188389, superior to the German
edition); F.J.E.Raby, A History of Christian-Latin Poetry (Oxford, 1927) and A History of Secular
Latin Poetry (2ed, 2V, Oxford, 1957).
VI
Wit and Wisdom
Proverbs
of Alfred
Their
Character
In two previous chapters1 we traced the survival of the Old English literary
tradition in its most prevalent form, religious pieces in prose and verse. It is
now necessary to note its appearance also in three works not of a religious
nature, the Proverbs of Alfred, The Owl and the Nightingale, and Layamons
Brut. The first two of these we shall consider in the present chapter. Layamons
Brut we shall merely recognize as belonging with them in time and secular
character, but we shall postpone the further consideration of it until chapter
VIII, where we can better indicate its place in the development of the Arthurian
legend. There is the more reason for this since in spite of being written in
English and being in verse and style the heir of Old English poetry, it derives
its subject matter from a French source.
The Proverbs of Alfred belongs to a very old type of didactic literature.
There seems to be something perennial in the desire to hear universal truths
even when they are so obvious as to be truisms. Nowadays the proverb is
generally short and pithy, the wisdom of many and the wit of one, as Lord
Russell expressed it, and is thus justified by its cleverness and quotable quality.
But there is apparently an equal disposition to treasure bits of homely wisdom
distilled from experience, especially when clothed with authority, associated
with the name of one who is reputed wise. It is this that accounts for the
popularity of the sayings of Poor Richard in colonial America. In literature
the proverb may also be a short discourse offering moral guidance or practical
advice as in the Proverbs of Solomon, and it is this form which the Proverbs
of Alfred takes. There is no reason to suppose that King Alfred is in any way
responsible for the observations here attributed to him, but his reputation for
wisdom was traditional and his name, like that of King Solomon, carried
conviction to the average Englishman in the centuries following his death.
Bad luck has pursued this interesting Middle English text. What appears
to have been the oldest and best MS2 was mostly consumed in the fire that
destroyed a part of the Cotton collection and damaged the Beowulf codex.
Our next oldest text is also fragmentary3 and a third MS was lost for thirty
years. In its fullest form the Proverbs of Alfred consists of about thirty-five
1
Chs. II and III.

Brief extracts are preserved and recently three leaves have been identified and printed by N.R.Ker
in MA, V (1936). 115120.
3
Discovered and published by Carleton Brown in MLR, XXI (1926). 250260.
2
152
WIT AND WISDOM
153
sayings amounting to a little more than 600 lines.4 The precepts fall into
three easily distinguished groups. In the initial group, consisting of the first
eleven sayings, the advice is general or concerned with matters of public
interest: a king should be learned and wise; earl and atheling should rule
justly; wealth without wisdom is of little value; it is transitory and often the
cause of a mans undoing; life itself is uncertain. In the middle group (sayings
1229), the largest and most interesting section, the precepts concern personal
conduct. There is advice on choosing a wife: choose her not for her face or
her possessionsyou may regret your choice the rest of your life. There are
rather cynical warnings against failing to rule ones wife firmly, listening to
her counsel, telling her too much of your businesswoman is word-mad.
Other teachings concern friendship, sparing the rod, excessive drinking,
misplaced confidencebelieve not every man, confide not too much in others;
a fair apple is often bitter inside. The suggestions are sometimes picturesquely
and effectively expressed. Instead of telling every one of your sorrow
Seie it ine sadel boze
& rid te singinde
tell it to thy saddle-bow and ride singing away. Much of this section and
the next anticipates the advice of Polonius to Laertes. The last group of precepts
is addressed to my son so dear, resembling in this respect some of the
proverbs of Solomon, and is of the familiar type of parental advice. It has to
do chiefly with choosing ones companions, especially whom to avoid. Give
the drunken man the road, cherish the old mans counsel, and the like. There
is at the end a curious warning not to choose for a companion the little man,
the long man, or the red-haired man.
The reputation of Alfreds proverbial sayings was already well established
in the twelfth century. They are referred to in the twelfth-century part of
the Annals of Winchester and mentioned by Ailred of Rievaulx, who died
in 1166. But we cannot be sure that these allusions are to the Proverbs in
written form, since in all likelihood such sayings circulated freely in oral
tradition. In The Owl and the Nightingale, discussed below, in which
proverbs are often quoted, eleven are specifically attributed to Alfred, but
only three of these are found in the existing collection. Nevertheless it is
almost certain that the literary form in which we have them goes back to
4
The most recent edition is that of Helen P.South, The Proverbs of Alfred Studied in the Light of
the Recently Discovered Maidstone Manuscript (1931). Valuable also is the edition of E.Borgstrm
(Lund, 1908) for its complete texts of the Trinity and Jesus MSS and its critical apparatus. For a
detailed study of the various versions and their relation see O.S.A. Arngart, The Proverbs of Alfred: I.
A Study of the Texts (Lund, 1942). A slightly later collection is known as the Proverbs of Hendyng.
Editions from different MSS will be found in Thomas Wright and J.O.Halliwell, ReliquiaeAntiquae
(184143), I. 109116; K.Bddeker, Altenglische Dichtungen des MS Harl. 2253 (Berlin, 1878), pp.
285300; H.Varnhagen, in Anglia, IV (1881). 182200; G.Schleich, Die Sprichwrter Hendings und
die Proverbis of Wisdom, Anglia, LI (1927). 220277 (a critical text). S.Singer, Die Sprichwrter
Hendings, Studia Neophil., XIV (1942), 3152, offers a commentary and a reconsideration of the
manuscripts. Modern renderings of both collections are in Jessie L.Weston, The Chief Middle-English
Poets (Boston, 1914). For the gnomic poems of Old English see above, p. 43.
Dissemination
154
the twelfth century. The Cotton MS was written early in the thirteenth century
and it is not the parent version. The language is more easily thought of as
that of the twelfth than of the thirteenth century. The metrical form is
essentially that of the Old English alliterative verse, much relaxed and
threatening at any moment to break into three-stress lines, occasionally bound
together into pairs by rime. The collection was probably put together in Sussex.
As a work of literature the Proverbs of Alfred is interesting not only in its
own right, but as an example of popular English tradition more secular than
religious in its content.
The existence of such a work in the twelfth century causes no surprise.
The Owl
Though not religious, except incidentally, it has its roots in folk wisdom and
and the
it traces its authority to an Old English king. But The Owl and the Nightingale5
Nightingale is another story. Written not far from the year 1200, it is a truly amazing
phenomenon in Middle English literature.
It is cast in the form of a debate, a heated argument between the two
birds. The literary debate, very popular in the Middle Ages, is a form that is
likely to flourish in a period of intellectual immaturity. It represents argument
for the sake of argument, disagreement not through conviction but for the
sake of matching wits. It is as though the individual has just discovered that
he has a mind and enjoys the exercise of his new-found capacity. As we grow
older and more polite we avoid arguments, and since nations and civilizations
are somewhat like individuals, the artificial disputation has largely disappeared
from our literature. The origin of the form has been traced back to the classical
eclogue of Theocritus and Virgil,6 which sometimes portrays a contest of
skill between two shepherds. In the Middle Ages there are well-known
examples as early as the eighth century. A Conflictus Veris et Hiemis is
Literary
attributed to Alcuin and in the ninth cen tury Sedulius Scotus composed De
Debate
Rosae Liliique Certamine. Thereafter examples multiply and we get disputes
between water and wine, the heart and the eye, youth and age, Phillis and
Flora, Ganymede and Helenacademic, moral, witty, sometimes obscene. One
of the most famous English examples is the Debate between the Body and
the Soul, which will be discussed in the next chapter. The conventions of the
type can be seen through the variety of subject matter and treatment. There
is generally an opening describing the setting and the occasion for the debate
or the circumstances under which the poet witnesses or overhears it. The
debate itself follows in the form of actual dialogue, and a decision may or
may not be rendered at the end. Often, as in The Owl and the Nightingale,
the poet professes to be ignorant of the result.
In the present instance the author comes upon the two birds in a secluded
5
The best-known editions are those of J.E.Wells (1907, revised 1909; Belles Lettres Ser.), W.Gadow
(1909; Palaestra, LXV), J.W.H.Atkins, with translation (1922), and J.H.G. Grattan and G.F.H.Sykes
(1935; EETSES, 119).
6
Cf. J.H.Hanford, Classical Eclogue and Medival Debate, Romanic Rev., II (1911). 1631.
120143.
WIT AND WISDOM
155
spot in an unnamed valley. The Nightingale is perched in a thick hedge, safe

from her opponents claws, while the Owl occupies an old tree-stump. The
Nightingale is the aggressor and provokes the argument by open insults.
Monster, she says, fly away! I am the worse for seeing thee. Thy ugliness
spoils my song. When I hear thy foul howling I would rather spit than sing!
The Owl waits until evening to reply, and although she is ready to burst with
rage, she controls herself very well. The Nightingale, she says, wrongs her
time and again. If once she would come out into the open, she would sing
another tune. This, of course, the Nightingale declines to do, and instead
continues to revile her opponent. Thou art loathsome to behold. Thy
body is short, thy neck is small, thy head is greater than all the rest of thee.
In this vein she accuses the Owl of unclean habits, raising a filthy brood that
defiles its own nest, and being in general a symbol of all that is worthless,
after which she breaks out into melodious song. The Owl listens perforce,
puffed out and swollen as if she had swallowed a frog. After a while the
Nightingale, quite unreasonably, proposes that they stop their useless
squabbling and proceed in a decent and orderly manner to argue their case
before a suitable judge. The Owl agrees, but the Nightingales tone does not
undergo any noticeable change. The dispute turns upon the respective merits
of their singing, but breaks over constantly into personalities and mutual
abuse. Neither can see that the other serves any useful purpose. The Owl
accuses the Nightingale of singing amatory songs and of enticing men and
women to sin. The Nightingale retorts that the Owl is a bird of ill omen,
whose song is ever of sorrow and misfortune. In the end the birds set out to
lay their case before the judgethe Owl says she can repeat every word from
beginning to endbut the poet disclaims knowledge of the outcome.
It would seem that so delightful and lively a poem might be allowed to
stand as an example of the bird fable, as a story told for its own sake,
without our seeking to find in it a hidden meaning which isnt there. But the
impulse to read allegorical significance into early works of literature, from
which even the Beowulf has not escaped, has been at work also on The Owl
and the Nightingale. The poem has been interpreted as symbolizing the
antagonism between pleasure and asceticism, gaiety and gravity, art and
philosophy, the minstrel and the preacher. Most recently it has been viewed
as a conflict between the ideals of the newer love poetry of courtly origin and
the religious, didactic poetry so prominent in medieval verse. A plausible
case can be made out for all these interpretations and it is a pleasant exercise
for ones ingenuity, but there is no necessity for seeing in the poem anything
more than a lively altercation between two birds, with the poets skill
sufficiently revealed in the matching of wits, the thrust and parry of the
opponents, the shrewd observation and homely wisdom for which the
argument gives constant occasion. Its popularity is not easy to estimate. It
survives in only two manuscripts, but there is record of a third and possibly
also of a version in French which belonged in the fourteenth century to the
abbey of Titchfield in Hampshire.7 This is not far from the region in which,
Not an
Allegory
156
Date
on the evidence of dialect and allusions, the poem was probably written. It is
interesting to note that the two MSS in which it is preserved today are those
in which many of the religious poems discussed above8 as evidence of the
survival of the native tradition have likewise come down to us. That the
poem is of English inspiration appears likely not only from the general tone
and the frequent citation of English proverbs, many of them attributed to
Alfred, but from the fact that no source has been found for the debate as a
whole. The author was familiar with the matter found in books on natural
history, but the theme and conduct of the poem seem to have been largely his
own invention.
It seems rather likely that the poem was written during the twelfth
century, although the attempt to fix upon a more precise date has led to
sharp differences of opinion. The earlier of the two MSS in which it exists is
assigned on paleographical grounds to the first half of the thirteenth century.
It contains an Anglo-Norman chronicle which stops at 1216 and the rest of
the page is left blank, contrary to the usual practice of the scribe, as if with an
eye to its possible continuation.9 The MS was most likely written at about
this time. The extant texts of The Owl and the Nightingale, however, go
back to an earlier copy; which was itself not the authors original. Allowing
for a reasonable time to permit of these stages in its transmission, we may
venture to assign the poem to a date before 1200. More precise dating
depends upon the interpretation placed upon certain allusions in the text.
Near the middle of the poem there is reference to an incident that happened
in the time of King Henry, and the mention of the king prompts the poet to
say Jesus his soule do merci! The king alluded to can hardly be other
than Henry II, who died in 1189, and if the natural interpretation is placed
upon these words and we infer that the king is dead, we must date the
poem after, but perhaps not long after 1189.10 A seemingly pregnant
allusion to this peace has been connected with a proclamation of 1195.11
An allusion to a papal mission to the north is less clear, and has been
interpreted in various ways. On the whole, a date in the closing years of the
7
See R.M.Wilson, More Lost Literature, II, Leeds Studies, VI. 3132.
Ch. II.
Although, as J.E.Wells has pointed out (MLN, XLVIII. 515519), the blank half page comes at
the end of a gathering, this is still the most natural interpretation.
10
Some scholars who interpret other allusions as referring to an earlier date seek to show that the
expression might have been used of a living person. See, for example, Henry B. Hinckley, The Date,
Author, and Sources of the Owl and the Nightingale, PMLA, XLIV (1929). 329359, and Kathryn
Huganir, The Owl and the Nightingale: Sources, Date, Author (Philadelphia, 1931). Arguments against
such an interpretation are presented by Frederick Tupper, The Date and Historical Background of
The Owl and the Nightingale, PMLA, XLIX (1934). 406427, and J.W.H.Atkins, A Note on the
Owl and the Nightingale, MLR, XXXV (1940). 5556. For additional discussion by these and other
scholars see the bibliographies mentioned on p. 109.
11
J.Hall, Selections from Early Middle English, II. 566, notes the peace maintained by the Justiciar
Hubert Walter during Richard Is absence in 119498, and Frederick Tupper, in the article referred to
above, calls attention to the Edictum Regium of 1195 requiring every man above the age of fifteen
years to take an oath that he would do all that in him lay for the preservation of the Kings Peace.
8
9
WIT AND WISDOM
157
twelfth century would seem to agree best with the present state of our
knowledge.
Naturally the authorship of such a poem is a matter of considerable
interest. Near the beginning of the debate the birds agree to refer their
differences to Master Nicholas of Guildford, who is praised by the
Nightingale as wise and prudent and an enemy of vice, one who has
moreover insight in matters of song. The Owl remarks that he was rather
passionate in days gone by and fond of the nightingales, but his ardor is now
cooled and she will trust his judgment. Again at the very end of the poem his
name is introduced with obvious explicitness and his place of residence is
carefully specified as at Portisham, in Dorsetshire. He is shamefully
neglected by the bishops, who bestow livings on their own kin, even on
children, while passing him by. He has but one dwelling, whereas it would be
for their own good if he were always at their service with livings in several
places. He delivers many right judgments and much wisdom through his
mouth and through his hand, whereby things are better even as far away as
Scotland. The most natural explanation of these passages is that the author
was taking the opportunity to call attention to himself, and we should
therefore seek to identify this Nicholas of Guildford. Various persons have
been proposed, but none of them possesses all the qualifications for a
completely satisfactory identification.12 Whoever he was, he was a man of
considerable learning, of an age to have left the wildness of youth behind
him, a cleric living at the time he wrote the poem in the Dorset town of
Portisham.13
The Owl and the Nightingale would have been a remarkable poem at any
date, even in the time of Chaucer. It would cause perhaps less surprise about
the year 1200 if it had been written in French. But the only thing French
about it is the four-stress couplet in which it is cast. For a poem of 1704 lines
to be written at this date in English on a secular theme, when almost everything
that we have in English verse is either religious or didactic, is what seems so
extraordinary. One remembers as comparable only occasional passages in
Layamons Brut. Its charm lies in its naturalness and freshness, the frankness
with which the birds bring their accusations against each other, the liveliness
and skill with which they meet each charge. They are very human in their
emotions and their reasoning, but they never cease to be birds, each revealing
the characteristics which are associated with its species in the popular mind.
The poem is without a dull moment; it is a superb jeu desprit, the clearest
proof that the English poetic impulse, in districts sufficiently removed from
the court, survived the Norman Conquest.
12
Gadow equates him with one of that name found in documents of the diocese of Salisbury in
1209 and 1220, but there is nothing to connect this man with Portisham. Miss Huganir suggests a
certain Nicholas, son of Thorwald, who served as an itinerant judge in certain counties between 1179
and 1182. Nothing connects him, however, with either Guildford or Portisham.
13
A note in the MS indicates that a song once in the volume was the work of a John of Guildford,
but it is not necessary to believe that he was therefore the author of the present poem.
Authorship
VII
For Their Souls Need
The
Ormulum
In the period before 1250, when the popular literature intended for the upper
class was almost certain to be in French, there is no more typical example of the
writing produced for the religious instruction and moral guidance of the mass
of the people than the Ormulum. Some of the most interesting and characteristic
works of the period to be written in English were composed, as the author of
this long poem tells us, to be read to the folk for their souls need.
The Ormulum1 is a poem which, if it had been preserved in its entirety,
would have reached, the amazing length of 150,000 lines. We have, however,
only about an eighth of it, some 20,000 short verses. As the author tells us in
his preface,
Piss boc iss nemmnedd Orrmulum
Forri att Orrm itt wrohhte,
& itt is wrohht off quarigan,
Off Goddspellbokess fowwre.2
It would seem that Orm combined the ending of the Latin word speculum, so
familiar in titles of medieval books (Speculum Historiale, Speculum Vitae,
etc.), with his own name. It is possible that he was conscious of the diminutive
force of the ending and was suggesting modestly that his effort should be
thought of as the little book of Orm. If so, it is the only evidence in the
entire work that he had a sense of humor, for it would have filled ten volumes
of modern print.
The name Orm (or Ormin) is Scandinavian. In the dedication addressed
to Walter, his brother, Orm says that they were both members of the same
religious order, the order of Augustinian canons. Attempts to identify him
have not been successful,3 but from his dialect it would seem that he lived
in the northeast Midlands, possibly in northern Lincolnshire, and wrote
about the year 1200. His laborious task was carried out at his brothers
bidding and now that he has finished it he asks him to examine every verse
and see that it contains nothing contrary to true belief. Conscious of his
1
Ed. R.M.White (2v, Oxford, 1852) and Robert Holt (2v, Oxford, 1878).
2
This book is named Ormulum

Because Orm wrought it,
And it is wrought of the quadriga
Of the four books of the gospel.
3
For conjectures see Henry Bradley, Where Was the Ormulum Written? Athenaeum, May 19,
1906, p. 609, and James Wilson, ibid., July 28, 1906, p. 104.
158
FOR THEIR SOULS NEED
159
own rectitude he scorns detractors and rests confident that he will have earned
his reward in Heaven.
What is the Ormulum? The author tells us that he has attempted with the
little wit that the Lord has lent himunfortunately not an understatement
to explain to ignorant folk most of the gospels that are read in the Mass
throughout the year. From the list of Latin texts drawn up at the beginning as
a kind of table of contents it is apparent that he went beyond the gospels and
included also a number of excerpts from the Acts of the Apostles. His method
is to begin with a paraphrase of the biblical passage and then to explain it in
an extended exposition:
Its
Purpose
Icc hafe sammnedd o iss boc

Pa Goddspelless neh alle,
Patt sinndenn o e messeboc
Inn all e zer att messe.
& azz affterr e Goddspell stannt
Patt tatt te Goddspell mene
Patt mann birr spellenn to e follc
Off ezzre sawle nede.
From this statement it might be inferred that the poet follows the missal and
explains the gospel narratives as they occur day by day. This, however, is not
what he does. He has reassembled the texts in a chronological arrangement,
giving us the life of Christ in a series of episodes with homiletic interpolations.
He has at times supplied links implying that his work was to be read
consecutively and not in sections according to the gospel of the day. Where
he found the materials for his explanations is still largely an unsolved problem.4
It must be admitted that in literary value the Ormulum approaches what
the physicist calls the absolute zero. It is very tedious. Orm was careful not
to overestimate the intelligence of his hearers, and he explains the obvious
at painful length. He is a master of the art of writing without making the
thought advance. He repeats himself shamelessly without so much as varying
the phrase. He would have made a good pedagogue. Yet, paradoxically, the
Ormulum is not without interest. In the first place, as a document in English
cultural history it shows with what plain fare any literary taste of the humble
classes might have to be satisfied when they were dependent for their
books on the benevolent zeal of the pious. One can only hope that an
abundant oral literature, though unrecorded, supplied what was missing
from a well-balanced diet. In the second place, the Ormulum is not without
interest as a revelation of human personality, for there if a personality be
4
The latest attempt at a solution is in H.C.Matthes, Die Einheitlichkeit des Ormulum (Heidelberg,
1933), where it is suggested that Orm used a Biblia cum Glossis, i.e., a text of the Bible provided with
the interlinear gloss of Anselm of Laon (or more probably Peter Lombard) and the marginal commentary
or Glossa Ordinaria commonly attributed to Walafrid Strabo. The present writers objections to this
theory are stated in JEGP, XXXVI (1937). 263268. Cf. also Matthes supplementary discussion,
Quellenauswertung und Quellenberufung im Orrmulum, Anglia, LIX (1935). 303318.
Its Value
160
Vices and
Virtues
Genesis
and
Exodus
hind it. It comes out most clearly in the dedication and the preface, but is
apparent throughout the work. It is that of a completely serious nature,
pursuing its laborious task with unswerving devotion and entire conviction.
Orm is never in doubt about the importance of his mission. His zeal never
flags. He is meticulous about little things, determined to be clear even to the
dullest mind, for souls are at stake. He devises a new system of spelling,5
thereby becoming our first spelling reformer, and admonishes future copyists
always to write consonants twice where they are doubled in his copy:
otherwise they may not write rightly the word. He was obviously a fussy
person, one that we might not enjoy living with, but distinctive. We would be
touched by his piety and unselfishness, wearied by his prolixity, irritated by
his insistence upon little things of no importance, but we would remember
him. The reward which he deserved and confidently looked forward to in the
next world is doubtless his, but the hope that his book would be often copied
and widely read was never realized. What survives is apparently a fragment
of his own holograph manuscript.
At about the same date as the Ormulum an anonymous treatise in prose
was written in the East Midland area, probably in Essex. It has been given
the name Vices and Virtues,6 since the beginning is a souls confession of its
sins and the remainder an extended discourse by Reason on a wide variety of
virtues. The treatise is cast in a slight framework of dialogue which amounts
to little more than an occasional request by the soul for further instruction
from Reason. Each vice or virtue is treated as a separate item without much
attempt at continuity or strict sequence. Yet the occasional instances in which
the preacher passes from the general to concrete and particular illustrations
of his teaching, or drops a remark which hints at contemporary conditions,
save the work from the dullness to which its commonplace matter and
workaday style would predispose it. Once in a long while the author surprises
us with a striking thought or picturesque phrase, as when he remarks that it
is a great wrath of God that man is so blind that he goes to Hell laughing.
But in general he presents his matter plainly and soberly, in a manner consistent
with his aim, expressed at the close through the mouth of Reason: Dear
soul, I have made this little writ with sore toilin order to instruct thee, to
warn thee, and to help thee and to save thee.
Serving the souls need in another way is the biblical paraphrase of Genesis
and Exodus7 written in its present form about 1250 in Norfolk, although
probably originating somewhat farther north. It consists of slightly more
than 4000 lines in fairly regular four-stress couplets. The author has great
faith in human nature:
5
The Ormulum is of the greatest value to the Middle English philologist in indicating for us the
quantity of the vowels in the many words which it contains.
6
Ed. F.Holthausen (London, 18881921; EETS, 89 and 159).
7
Ed. Richard Morris (London, 1865; EETS, 7). The suggestion of Ten Brink that the Exodus
might be by a different author is disposed of by A.Fritzsche, Ist die altenglische Story of Genesis and
Exodus das Werk eines Verfassers? Anglia, V (1882). 4390.
161
Cristene men ogen ben so fagen

So fueles arn quan he it sen dagen,
an man hem telled soSe tale
Wid londes speche and wordes smale
Of blisses dune, of sorwes dale.8
And so he begins to tell the story of Genesis with many an interesting detail.
The Devil was created on Sunday and fell out on Monday. Adam was
made in Damascus field. While God created woman Adam slept and saw
in a dream much that should be hereafter. The womans first name was Issa;
after she brought us to woe Adam named her Eve. Abel was a hundred years
old when Cain slew him. Such legendary matter is most prevalent in the first
five hundred lines. The Exodus is more selective and considerably shorter
than the Genesis. It is concerned mainly with the life of Moses. Out of
Latin, says the poet, this song is drawn, and it is clear that he drew upon
more than the Bible. He certainly used the Historia Scholastica of Peter
Comestor and we may feel fairly sure that he used it at first hand.9 It is
equally certain that in the earlier pages he had other sources as well, possibly
one of the biblical paraphrases in French verse. Genesis and Exodus lacks the
poetical quality, the richness of phrase and emotional force, of the Old English
Genesis and other Old English biblical poetry, but it tells its story clearly and
easily, and by a judicious selection of incidents offers a pleasantly versified
survey of early Old Testament history.
Written in the same dialect and at about the same time is the Middle
English representative of a popular medieval type, the Bestiary.10 The poem,
some 800 short lines, is made up of descriptions more or less fabulous of the
lion, eagle, serpent, ant, hart, fox, spider, whale, mermaid, elephant, turtledove, panther, and the culver or dove, followed in each case by a Christian
application or moral. The Bestiary is associated in our minds with popular
science, and doubtless it was for its natural history that it enjoyed its great
popularity. But in plan and intention it was a work of religious and moral
edification and should be so thought of. The fictitious natural history is
adopted for the sake of the moral.
Cethegrand [whale] is a fis [fish]
e moste Sat in water is.
When the sea is stormy it comes to the surface. Sailors, thinking it is an
island, take refuge on its back and build a fire. When the whale eventually
feels the heat, it dives to the bottom, carrying all its too trusting victims
8
Christian men ought to be as fain

As birds are when they see it become day,
When man tells them a true tale
With native speech and words small,
Of blisss down [upland], of sorrows dale.
Cf. Fritzsche, op. cit., p. 48.

Edited several times but most accessible in Richard Morris, An Old English Miscellany (London,
1872; EETS, 49) and Joseph Hall, Selections from Early Middle English (Oxford, 1920). See also
above, p. 136.
10
The
Bestiary
162
The
Harrowing
of Hell
The
Body and
Soul
to destruction. It symbolizes the devil and his wiles. The serpent when old fasts
until its skin grows loose about it; then it strips off its covering by crawling
through a stone with a hole in it. Man by fasting and penance should in like
manner free himself from the sins in which he has become enveloped. The
elephant is made to illustrate all Christian history. It falls, like man, because
of a tree; it cannot be raised by its fellows until one young elephant (like Christ)
effects its release. The English poem is a free rendering of the Latin Physiologus
of Theobaldus, an eleventh-century abbot, it is thought, of Monte Cassino.
But all medieval bestiaries go back ultimately to a Greek text of the fourth
century written in Alexandria, or, more probably, in Caesarea in Palestine,11
and translated into Syriac, Armenian, and most of the European languages.
The influence of the Physiologus on medieval art was widespread, and allusions
to bestiary material are frequent in literature down to the Age of Elizabeth,
when Lyly made unnatural natural history a feature of Euphuistic style,12
A religious theme which enjoyed equal popularity throughout Europe in
the Middle Ages was the story of Christs descent into Hell to release the
souls of those who had lived worthily and died before His coming. The
Harrowing of Hell13 in Middle English verse was written about 1250. It is
based on the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus,14 which contributed not only
this striking episode to literature but is largely responsible for the popularity
of such legends as that of Longinus, who pierced Christs side with his spear
and was cured of blindness by the blood which fell on his eyes, of St. Veronica
and her handkerchief, of Seths mission to Paradise for the oil of mercy, of
Antichrist, and other characters and incidents. The framework of the
Harrowing of Hell is narrative, but after a forty-line introduction the account
proceeds entirely by means of dialogue in which Adam and Eve, Abraham,
David, John the Baptist, and Moses call confidently upon Christ and in each
case have their claims acknowledged. The form of the text renders it suitable
for dramatic presentation, but there is no evidence that it was ever so produced.
The liveliest of the early religious and admonitory works considered in
this chapter is a spirited debate known as the Disputisoun between the Body
and the Soul.15 The poet, lying in bed on a winter night, sees a marvelous
11
See Max Wellman, Der Physiologus (Leipzig, 1930). The standard earlier authority is Fr. Lauchert,
Geschichte des Physiologus (Strassburg, 1889); Lauchert is also the author of the article in the Catholic
Encyclopedia.
12
Cf. John Lyly, Works, ed; R.W. Bond (3V, Oxford, 1902), intro., I. 131134.
13
The text is edited from all MSS by William H.Hulme, The Middle-English Harrowing of Hell
and Gospel of Nicodemus (London, 1907; EETSES, 100). For the development of the legend see Hulmes
introduction and J.Monnier, La Descente aux Enfers (Paris, 1905). On the popularity of the theme in
drama see Karl Young, The Drama of the Medieval Church (Oxford, 1933), I. 149177, and the works
mentioned on p. 561.
14
The Latin Gospel of Nicodemus consists of two parts, the Acta Pilati (fourth century) and the
Descensus Christi ad Inferos (second or third century). The text is in C.Tischendor f, Evangelia
Apocrypha (Leipzig, 1876), English translation in M.R.James, The Apocryphal New Testament (Oxford,
1924). Versions in Middle English verse (c. 13001325) and prose exist, the verse texts being edited by
Hulme, as above.
15
Four of the seven manuscripts of the text are printed by W.Linow, pe Desputisous bitwen e
Bodi and e Soule (Erlangen, 1889; Erlanger Beitrge, 1).
163
visionthe body of a proud knight lying on a bier. As the soul of the dead
man is about to depart, it pauses and beholds the body from which it has just
come. Woe worth thy flesh, thy foul blood! it says, and proceeds to taunt
the Body truculently. Where now are its castles and towers, its rich clothes,
its fine horses, its cunning cooks, through whose skill it made its foul flesh to
swell ? Now both Body and Soul shall suffer the pains of Hell. The Body
retorts that it was the Souls business to keep it from evil. But this simple
exculpation does not suffice. Body, be still! says the Soul. Who taught
thee all this wit? Both of us shall answer for our misspent life at Doomsday.
Thou hast paid no heed to God. Now thou art loathsome to see: no lady
would kiss thee: thy friends would flee if they saw thee coming down the
street. The Bodys rejoinder is that it did nothing without the Soul, that it
would have been better off without a soul, like a dumb beast conscious of no
hereafter. The Soul denies that it had any influence over the Body after its
childhood, and the Body argues that more strict discipline in youth would
have saved it. After this the Soul weeps and reiterates its charges of the Bodys
wilful ways. Finally the Body laments its past life, but as the Soul says, it is
too late. Repentance is futile after death. And now the Soul may linger no
longer. The fiends of Hell are heard crying exultantly as they come to fetch it
away. There is a terrifying description of the tortures inflicted by the devils as
they fall upon the unhappy Soul, and the dreamer awakes in a cold sweat
because of the scene which he has witnessed.
The origin of this lively conception has been traced back to the Eastern
church,16 to a sermon, or sermons, of the memento mori type in which a
reminder of death is used as an inducement to virtue, and the admonition is
pointed by an exemplum portraying the death of a sinful man amid the
reproaches of the departing soul. There were apparently two types of this
sermon: one a fairly common type in which only the soul speaks, and the
other a type of which the only example yet known consists of some fragments
embedded in an Irish homily of the Leabhar Breac, in which the body speaks
in reply. The first may be considered the prototype of those Body and Soul
texts in which the Soul addresses the Body, but the Body does not reply.17
The second type is presumably the ancestor of the debates between the
Body and Soul. The earliest literary treatment of the debate type is a long
Latin poem of the twelfth century, the importance of which has only
recently been demonstrated.18 It is the source of a number of subsequent
treatments in Latin, French, Spanish, etc. In spite of considerable merit,
the poem is lacking in that lively interchange of accusation and rejoinder
necessary to the true debate. This defect was supplied by a thirteenth-century
16
On the beginnings of the legend see Th. Batiouchkof, Le Dbat de lame et du corps, Romania,
XX (1891). 155; 513578, and Louise Dudley, The Egyptian Elements in the Legend of the Body and
Soul (Baltimore, 1911).
17
Such as the Old English Address of the Soul to the Body (see above, p. 81) and the early Middle
English text preserved in the Worcester Fragments (see p. 82).
18
Eleanor Kellogg Heningham. An Early Latin Debate of the Body and Soul (1939).
Its
Origin
164
poem, the Conflictus Corporis et Animae, which may well have been the
work of Bishop Grosseteste.19 In this Latin form the Body and Soul theme
attained its widest circulation,20 and it is from this text that the Middle English
poem derives.
Nearly all these works of religious edification or moral exhortation of the
thirteenth century may be considered as patterns for later writings of a similar
kind. The Ormulum, for example, may be compared with the Northern
Homily Cycle (p. 205), the Genesis and Exodus with the earlier part of the
Cursor Mundi (p. 206), the Vices and Virtues with Handlyng Synne (p. 204)
or the Parsons Tale. Occasionally they inspired direct imitation as when an
unknown poet modeled after the debate of the Body and Soul a similar
dialogue between the Body and the Worms.21 Always the motive is the same:
each poet is writing for the people something for their souls need.
19
See Hans Walther, Das Streitgedicht in der lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters (Munich, 1920),
pp. 70 ff.
20
There are 132 MSS extant. The poem is often called the Visio Philiberti. Entering into the Body
and Soul poems and many other religious works involving legends of Heaven and Hell are elements
which received wide circulation in the Middle Ages through the apocryphal Visio Pauli. On this
important text see Theodore Silverstein, Visio Sancti Pauli: The History of the Apocalypse in Latin
together with Nine Texts (London, 1933; Studies and Documents, ed. K. and S.Lake, Vol. IV).
21
Edited by Karl Brunner, Archiv, CLXVII (1935). 2935.
VIII
The Arthurian Legend to Layamon
The most popular theme which later English poetry derived from medieval
legend is the story of King Arthur, his wife, Guinevere, and the celebrated
knightsLancelot, Gawain, Perceval of Grail fame, and many others
associated with his court.1 The origin of many of the stories which came
eventually to make up this complex body of material is obscure and we cannot
even be certain that an historical figure lies behind the character of Arthur
himself. In the present chapter we shall consider the development of the legend
up to Layamon, the point at which it first makes its appearance in English,
reserving our treatment of the romances concerned with this matter for a
later chapter.
It is universally acknowledged that the story of Arthur belongs to Celtic
in Wales and Cornwall. It seems to have remained largely a matter of
local interest until the twelfth, or as some believe, the eleventh century. It
achieved European circulation and renown with the publication of the
Historia Regum Britanniae (1137) of Geoffrey of Monmouth and the
Arthurian romances of the greatest of French writers of romance, Chrtien
de Troyes (fl. 116090) .2 On these simple facts there is general agreement,
1
The first comprehensive work on the Arthurian legend was J.D.Bruce, The Evolution of Arthurian
Romanceto1300 (2V, Baltimore and Gttingen, 1923; rptd. with supplement to bibliography by
A.Hilka, 1928; Hesperia, Ergnzungsreihe, VIIIIX). The subsequent bibliography may be found in
Arthurian Bibliography, Vol.1 (192229), Vol. II (193035) compiled by John J.Parry and Margaret
Schlauch for the MLA (1931, 1936), and continued for subsequent years in MLQ. E.K.Chambers,
Arthur of Britain (1927) is a brief but stimulating treatment. For the earliest materials see Robert
H.Fletcher, The Arthurian Material in the Chronicles (1906; Harvard Studies & Notes in Phil & Lit.,
X). Edmund Farals discussion of this material, La Lgende Arthurienne (3V, Paris, 1929), has a strong
anti-Celtic bias. On the French Arthurian romances the article of Gaston Paris, Romans en vers du
cycle de la Table Ronde, Hist. Litt, de la France, XXX (1888), 1270, is indispensable.
2
Chrtien de Troyes is the author of the earliest Arthurian romances that have come down to
us: Erec et Enide, Cligs, Lancelot (or Le Conte de la Charette), Yvain, and Perceval, or Le Conte
du Graal. In addition, he mentions a poem on King Marc and Iseult which has not survived but
which must have been concerned with at least a part of the Tristan and Iseult story. The extant
romances of Chrtien were written in the order named, but they cannot be dated more precisely
than c. 11601190. (For an attempt to push the earlier date forward somewhat, see F.E.Guyer, in
MP, XXVI (1929). 257277.) The standard editions of Erec, Cligs, Lancelot, and Yvain are those
of Wendelin Foerster (Halle, 1884-). These romances have been translated into English by
W.W.Comfort for the Everymans Library (1913). The Conte du Graal was left unfinished at Chrtiens
death (about 10,000 lines) and continued by a succession of continuators to a length of 60,000 lines.
The text of Chrtiens portion is now available in Alfons Hilka, Der Percevalroman (Halle, 1932),
replacing the very scarce edition of C.Potvin (6v, Mons, 186571). For a bibliography of Chrtien
scholarship see John R.Reinhard, Chrtien de Troyes: A Bibliographical Essay, Essays and Studies
in English and Compar. Lit. (Ann Arbor, Mich., 1932), pp. 195231, and Wilhelm Kellermann, Wege
165
The
Arthurian
Legend
Of Celtic
Origin
166
Celticists
and
Inventionists
Scarcity
of Welsh
Texts
but on a number of other important questions scholarly opinion is sharply

divided. How fully developed were Arthurian stories in Celtic literature? How
much did Chrtien and other French poets owe to Celtic sources? Were there
Arthurian romances in French before Chrtien? Was Arthur an historical
figure? Did Geoffrey of Monmouth have an ancient book in the British tongue,
as he maintained, even though his own work is demonstrably more than a
translation of such a volume?
On the first three of these questions scholars split sharply into two schools,
the Celticists and the inventionists. The former are strongly impressed by the
many parallels between the romances of Chrtien and of other medieval poets
on the one hand and Celtic stories, folk-tales, and popular traditions on the
other.3 They believe that the writers of French romances derived an important
part of their material from Welsh and Breton tradition, either written or oral.
The opponents of this view, however, feel that the indebtedness of French
authors to Celtic sources has been overstressed. They insist that Chrtien and
his contemporaries were not folklorists but poets possessed with creative
imagination, and that they enjoyed the same privilege of inventing their stories
as do modern poets. It may be questioned whether what we know or the
ways of medieval poets in other fields than Arthurian legend justifies the
belief that they habitually exercised this privilege, but at least the position of
the inventionists has the virtue of simplicity: what cannot be traced to a
source fairly close at hand can be credited to the invention of the poet.
It must be admitted that the Celticists have sometimes pushed their quest
for parallels pretty far, but the proper presentation of their point of view is
rendered difficult by the paucity of Welsh and Breton literature that has
come down to us from early times. For Brittany there are no literary texts
from the Middle Ages. What survives from the Welsh literature of this period
is mainly contained in four manuscripts that fill two moderate-sized volumes
of modern print.4 If the surviving Welsh literature were in any way
comparable in richness to that of Ireland, where geographical and political
separation permitted an unbroken continuity of language and literary
tradition, many problems of Arthurian origins which must continue to
trouble us would be readily settled. As it is, recourse must be had constantly
to Irish literature. Since the Welsh and the Irish are merely different branches
of the same ethnic and linguistic stock, it is to be assumed that they
preserved many traditions in common and may well have influenced each
other. Although Irish literature does not know Arthur, we find many
parallels in incident and motif with Arthurian romance, which give us some
und Ziele der neuen Chrestien de Troyes-Forschung, Germ-Rom. Monatsschrift, XXIII (1935). 204
228.
3
For examples of this view see the studies of Arthur C.L.Brown, particularly Iwain: A Study in the
Origins of Arthurian Romance (Boston, 1903; Harvard Studies & Notes in Phil. & Lit., VIII.) and
The Round Table before Wace, ibid., VII (1900). 183205. A more extreme position is taken by
Roger S.Loomis, Celtic Myth and Arthurian Romance (1927).
4
W.F.Skene, Four Ancient Books of Wales (2V, Edinburgh, 1868).
THE ARTHURIAN LEGEND TO LAYAMON
167
idea of what we might expect in Welsh literature if it had been preserved in

equal fullness. However, the existence among the Mabinogion5 of a Welsh
story like Kulhwch and Olwen with its obviously primitive features is an
indication that a well-developed body of Arthurian narrative existed among
the Welsh before such stories appear in French literature in the work of
Chrtien de Troyes.
With the poems of Chrtien French romances of Arthurian theme reached
their highest perfection in the Middle Ages. But these poems are also the
earliest Arthurian romances that have come down to us, and therefore some
students are disposed to credit Chrtien with the creation of the type. This is
somewhat as if the author of Hamlet had been the inventor of English tragedy,
or at least of the revenge play It is not usual for new literary types to spring
fully formed from the heac of Jove, and such a method of accounting for
Hamlet would not carry full conviction even if we could not trace the
development of English drama back through the Spanish Tragedy and
Gorboduc to the Quem quaeritis (see chapter XIX). It is some such difficulty
as this that many scholars find with the view that Chrtien was the creator of
Arthurian romance. And, indeed, there is some evidence at least that Arthurian
stories that could not have come from Geoffrey of Monmouth were known
on the Continent at least by the time Chrtien was writing and probably as
early as the close of the previous century. This is not the place to go into the
evidence, which Pio Rajna called attention to,6 of Italians who had been
named after Arthur and Gawain before 1100, or the implications of the
Arthurian sculpture on the cathedral at Modena in northern Italy, which
some scholars date 10991106 and others put after the middle of the twelfth
century.7 It is enough for us here to recognize that there are many uncertainties
in the early history of the Arthurian legend, many questions on which it is illadvised to be too dogmatic.
If Arthur played a part in actual history, it was as a leader of the Celts
in their resistance to the Teutonic invaders at the beginning of the sixth
century. The name is Roman (Artorius) and suggests a Roman family
settled in Britain. We know of a Roman military man who held a high command
5
The Mabinogion has become almost in English classic in the translation of Lady Charlotte Guest,
which has often been reprinted. A critical edition of the Welsh text with scholarly apparatus and a
more literal, French translation will be found in J.Loth, Les Mabinogion (2ed., 2v, Paris, 1913).
6
Pio Rajna, Gli eroi brettoni nell onomastica italiana del secolo XII, Romania, XVII (1888).
161185, 355365.
7
The bibliography of this controversy has become too extensive to record here. The arguments for
an early date are presented (with excellent plates) by Roger S.Loomis in The Date, Source, and Subject
of the Arthurian Sculpture at Modena, Medieval Studies in Memory of Gertrude Schoepperle Loomis
(Paris, 1927), pp. 209228, and La Lgende archologique la cathdrale de Modne, Gaz. des
Beaux-Arts, XVIII (1928). 109122. The most recent attacks on an early date are Leonardo Olschki,
La Cattedrale di Modena c il suo rilievo Arturiano, Archivum Romanicum, XIX (1935). 145182,
and G.H.Gerould, Arthurian Romance and the Date of the Relief at Modena, Speculum, X (1935).
355376, to which Professor Loomis has replied in The Modena Sculpture and Arthurian Romance,
Studi Medievali, n.s. IX (1936). 117, and Geoffrey of Monmouth and the Modena Archivolt.
Speculum, XIII (1938). 221231. From these articles the previous scholarship on the question can be
assembled.
The
Mabinogion
Were
There
Arthurian
Romances
before
Chrtien?
Arthur
168
Nennius
Geoffrey
of
Monmouth
in the island in the third century,8 and who might have left numerous descendants
in a profession which was traditional in Roman families. There is no mention of
Arthur in any contemporary record, and we cannot but consider it strange that
Gildas,9 who mentions the battle of Mount Badonin later accounts Arthurs
most famous battlemakes no mention of Arthur, but names Ambrosius
Aurelianus as the distinguished Roman leader of the Celtic forces. The earliest
explicit mention of the Arthur of later romance is in a compilation of around
800 known as the Historia Brittonum, by Nennius.10 Here Arthur receives a
paragraph and is said to have been twelve times chosen as the leader of the Celts
and to have been victorious in twelve great battles. In the last of these, the battle
of Mount Badon, he is credited with killing 960 of the enemy single-handed. It
is clear that in Nennius Arthur has already become the object of legendary
exaggeration, but it is interesting to observe that Nennius describes him as dux
bellorum, not as a king, and explicitly says that there were many more noble in
rank than he. This seems to ring true, and in spite of the lack of trustworthy
evidence, most scholars are disposed to agree with Oman when he says, Iincline
to think that a real figure lurks beneath the tale of the Historia Brittonum
It would be interesting to pause over the bits of Arthurian material in the
Annales Cambriae (c. 954),11 in the Chronicle of Mont St. Michel (after 1056)
in which Arthur is called Rex Britannorum, in the lives of certain Welsh
saints,12 the miracle reported by Herman of Tournai some time after 1113, 13
and the testimony of William of Malmesbury to the existence of popular
traditions concerning Arthur in his Gesta Re gum Anglorum (1125) since this
is the work of an Englishman. None of these texts throw any light on the
historical character of Arthur, but they would bear witness to his growing
popularity and the existence of numerous legends about him as well as about
Gawain, Kai, Bedevere, and others associated with him. We must, however,
turn at once to the most important work in the earlier history of this legend.
Geoffrey of Monmouth (c. 1100c. 1155) was born and reared in Wales,
though possibly of Breton stock,14 and, like Sir Walter Scott later, must have
been saturated from childhood with the folk tales and traditions of the story-loving
8
Cf. the art. Artorius in Pauly-Wissowa, Real-Encyclopdie, Charles Oman, Englana before the
Norman Conquest (1910), p. 211, Kemp Malone. Artorius, MP. XXII (1925). 367374, and
R.G.Collingwood and J.N.L.Myres, Roman Britain and the English Settlements (Oxford, 1936), pp.
320324.
9
The De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae (written about 545) gives after a fashion an account of
the history of Britain (first twenty-six chapters) but the greater part of the treatise is an attack upon
certain rulers in Gildass own day, the policy of forming an alliance with the Teutons, and the vices of
the British people which have brought their present misfortunes upon them. He also makes no mention
of Constantine, Germanus, Hengist, and others whom he might be expected to refer to. The standard
edition is that of Mommsen in the Mon. Germ. Hist. (1898). There is a translation in John A.Giles, Six
Old English Chronicles (1848).
10
The standard editions are those of Mommsen, op. cit., and Ferdinand Lot, Nennius et lHistoria
Brittonum (Paris, 1934). Translation also in Giles.
11
On these matters see Bruce, and other works mentioned in the footnote on p. 165.
12
Cf. the most recent examination of these texts by J.S.P.Tatlock, The Dates of the Arthurian
Saints Legends, Speculum, XIV (1939). 345365.
13
See E.Faral, Un des plus anciens textes relatifs Arthur, Arthuriana, I (1929). 2129.
14
See Sir John Edward Lloyd, Geoffrey of Monmouth, EHR, LVII (1942). 460468.
169
Celts. From the age of about thirty he was living as a canon at Oxford, and,
having friends like Walter the Archdeacon and Robert de Chesney, must have
looked forward in like manner to a career in the Church. Whether obeying
an innate urge or acting with an eye to promotion, he produced a book
ostensibly recording the early history of Britain, the Historia Regum Britanniae
(1137) ,15 It is full of legendary matter that has found its way into later English
literaturestories of Locrine, Lear, Gorboduc, Cymbeline, and the like. What
is more important, it reaches by the middle of Book VI the figures of Uther
Pendragon and Merlin, and continues with Arthurian matters to the end of
the work. In all about two-fifths of a sizable volume are devoted to the doings
of King Arthur.16 We get the story of his birth and Merlins share in the affair
between Uther and Ygerne. Upon Uthers death, Arthur becomes king, subdues
the Picts and Scots, conquers Ireland, Iceland, Norway, Dacia, Aquitaine,
and Gaul, with of course the help of Gawain and other loyal supporters.
There is an excellent account of his single combat with Frollo, governor of
Gaul. He celebrates his victories with a magnificent court and coronation
ceremony attended by princes from all over western Europe. In the midst of
the revelry Rome demands tribute of the Britons, a demand which is not only
scornfully rejected but which leads Arthur to determine on the conquest of
the imperial city. He commits the government and Queen Guanhumara to
his nephew Mordred and sails for the Continent, only to be recalled by his
nephews treason and his wifes disloyalty. There is an account of Guineveres
flight to a nunnery, the defeat of Mordred, and the carrying of the mortally
wounded Arthur to Avalon. Here is the full framework of the story so well
known to us in later times. In it Arthur occupies the center of the stage and
has not yet been thrust into the background by the adventures of his famous
followers. He is represented as a great warrior, conquering all the better known
parts of the world, rather than as a fairy king holding sway over a realm not
too clearly defined.
In the dedication and in three other places in the volume Geoffrey claims
as his authority a certain ancient book in the British tonguethat is, in
Welsh or Bretonwhich he was given by his friend Walter, Archdeacon of
Oxford. This book, he says, related in due sequence and in stories of
exceeding beauty the whole history of the island from Brutus, the first king
of the Britains, down to Cadwallader, the son of Cadwallo. All he has had
to do is to turn it into simple and unadorned Latin. This modest avowal is
not to be taken too seriously. No such book is known and in his later references
to it the author, it strikes us, doth protest too much. It is hard to reconcile
his close paraphrases and direct borrowings from Gildas, Nennius, Bede,
Livy, and even Virgil, with the idea of a simple translation of a Celtic book,
to say nothing of the appearance, thinly disguised, of numerous incidents
15
The text is conveniently available in Acton Griscom, The Historia Regum Britanniae of Geoffrey
of Monmouth (London, 1929) and Edmond Faral, La Lgende Arthurienne (3V, Paris, 1929).
16
Geoffrey of Monmouth is possibly the author also of a Latin poem of 1529 lines on the life of
Merlin. Text and translation will be found in J.J.Parry, The Vita Merlini (Urbana, 1925).
His
Avowed
Source
170
Wace
Layamons
Brut
in recent history transferred to ancient times. Geoffreys Historia is a mixture

of matter drawn from previous books, the products of his own free invention,
and probably a large element of legendary lore. It would not have done to
admit that what purported to be a serious history was partly fiction and
partly a synthesis of old wives tales.17
The popularity of Geoffreys history, whatever some of his contemporaries
thought of its validity, was very great,18 but its enjoyment was naturally limited
to those who could read Latin. For a large number of men and women at the
court it would have remained a closed book if it had not been translated. Several
translations, indeed, soon appeared in French verse, among them one by
Geoffrey Gaimar, another by Wace. Gaimars version is lost,19 no doubt a victim
of neglect after the appearance of Waces more brilliant rendering, the Roman
de Brut (1155).20 Wace was a Norman poet (c. 1100c. 1175) who wrote
under English patronage.21 In his 15,000 lines he converted Geoffreys dignified
prose narrative into a lively and vigorous story. Geoffrey was ostensibly writing
history; Wace was writing a poem. He paints vivid pictures, dramatizes
important incidents, gives expression to his personal feelings, and never seems
to forget the audience he is aiming to please. He makes a few interesting additions
to his source, and mentions three times the Round Table in a manner which
suggests that it was already familiar to his audience. Yet these are the earliest
references to it in literature. It is apparent that he was familiar with Arthurian
traditions apart from what he found in Geoffrey of Monmouth.22
The Arthurian story makes its first appearance in English in the work of
a humble priest living on the banks of the Severn in Worcestershire. As he
tells us in the preface to his work, his name was Layamon 23 and he was
attached to the church at Ernley (Arley Regis), near. Radstone. While
enjoying this quiet life of a clerk, he says, it came into his mind to write about
17
On Geoffrey of Monmouths literary practices see Vol. II of Faral, who minimizes, however, the
elements that may have come from popular tradition.
18
This is evident from the more than 200 manuscripts still extant. Alfred of Beverley, writing
about 1150, says it was such a common subject of conversation that any one who did not know its
stories was considered a fool. A part of its popularity may have been: due to the satisfaction it gave the
Anglo-French court to point to something in the past history of Britain comparable to Charlemagne
and his peers in France. See G.H.Gerould, King Arthur and Politics, Speculum, II (1927). 3351.
19
On Gaimar see above, p. 138. A text known as the Mnchener Brut has sometimes been thought
a fragment of Gaimars version, but there are objections to this view. See the discussion by Alexander
Bell, The Munich Brut and the Estoire des Bretuns. MLR, XXXIV (1939). 321354.
20
Edited by Le Roux de Lincy (2v, Rouen, 183638). A new edition has now appeared in the SATF,
edited by Ivor Arnold (2v, Paris, 193840).
21
Layamon tells us that Wace dedicated the Roman de Brut to Eleanor of Aquitaine, and it was for
her husband, Henry II, that he began a poem of similar character on the history of Normandy, the
Roman de Rou (Rollo). See above, p. 138.
22
See also Margaret Houck, The Sources of the Roman de Brut of Wace (Berkeley, 1941; Univ. of
Calif. Pub. in English, Vol. V, No. 2).
23
Properly Lazamon. The spelling Layamon is a concession to printers fonts sanctioned by usage.
The guttural spirant was vocalized in the twelfth century to form a diphthong au, often written aw.
Consequently some scholars prefer the modernization Lawman. The only edition of Layamons Brut is
that of Sir Frederic Madden (3V, 1847), where the two texts are printed in parallel. See also N.Bgholm,
The Layamon Texts: A Linguistiral Investigation (Copenhagen, 1944; Travaux du cercle linguistique
de Copenhague, III).
171
the noble deeds of the English, and with this purpose in view he traveled
about in search of books on the subject. The three that he acquired were
Bedes Ecclesiastical History in the Old English translation inspired by King
Alfred; the Latin text of this, which he does not seem to have fully recognized;
and the work of a French clerk named Wace (how he could write!). He set
out to condense these three works into a single narrative, but it is clear that
he soon found himself so completely under the spell of Wace that he put the
other two aside and devoted himself to turning the Roman de Brut into English.
Allusions in his poem show that he was writing after the death of Henry II
(1189) and probably just before King John forbade the payment of Peters
pence in May, 1206. It is customary, therefore, to assign Layamons Brut to
the year 1205.
The English poem is twice the length of the French. The difference is due
mainly to a certain leisurely manner that seems to characterize Layamon. He
adds to an idea already adequately expressed a line of explanation or
supplement; he sometimes repeats himself in only slightly different words.
He did not aim at terseness or compression. To a slight extent the difference
in length is due to new materials which he introduced. These are not numerous
but have a certain significance. They include such things as the gifts which
the elves conferred upon Arthur at birth, the description of his armorits
magic properties or fabrication by supernatural smithsthe dream in which
he received warning of Mordreds treason, and added circumstances in the
account of the passing of Arthur. But the longest and most interesting addition
which Layamon makes is the story of the creation of the Round Table
describing the fighting that broke out at a Christmas feast over precedence at
table, and telling how some time later when the king was journeying in
Cornwall a skilful craftsman in wood offered to fashion him a table at which
sixteen hundred or more could sit without discrimination yet which could be
folded up and carried about from place to place. An attempt has often been
made in the past to account for these additional features by suggesting that
Layamon may have had a version of the Roman de Brut fuller in certain
respects than that available in the edition of Le Roux de Lincyin other
words, an expanded Wace. But the recent publication of a new text based
upon all the extant manuscripts does not support this view, and we must
continue to suppose that Layamon, like Wace, was familiar with Arthurian
traditions, oral or written, not found in his immediate source.
In spite of the fact that he was translating from a French source Layamon
is a thoroughly English poet. He had apparently been brought up on the
Old English alliterative verse and his own lines are so clearly in this
tradition that about half of them can be scanned by Old English standards.
He makes frequent use of rime, however, as an additional ornament. The
tradition which he represents is apparently a late one which has left behind
some of the older practices and acquired certain new habits in their place.24
24
See J.S.P.Tatlock. Lazamons Poetic Style and Its Relations, Manly Anniversary Studies (Chicago,
1923), pp. 311.
Layamons
Additions
Its
English
Character
172
Layamon
the Poet
Nevertheless it is still English. His vocabulary is remarkable for the small

number of French words in it, particularly in view of the fact that he was
translating from a French poem. But it is in those less tangible qualities of
tone and spirit that he is perhaps most English of all.25 In scores of little
touches he adds to or alters a scene, an image, or an idea, until it appears
something quite different from what it was in Wace. He has an eye for nature
and outdoor life, the sea and the sky. Arrows fly as thick as hail; a cornered
warrior is compared to a wild boar at bay; Childeric pursued by Arthur is
likened to a fox with the dogs following close on his trail, seeking his hole
only to be trapped. These are images drawn from his own observation, but
he seems to be equally at home, at least in imagination, in describing animated
scenes of feasting and revelry in hall and palace or the very different activities
of war and the battlefield. Layamon is more than a translator; he is a poet
and his effects are the effects of conscious art.
This is the first and also for quite a while the last appearance of King
Arthur in English. When he again returns to the island of his birth it will be
after a considerable sojourn in France, a sojourn which has profoundly altered
his character.
25
See Henry Cecil Wyld, Lazamon as an English Poet, RES, VI (1930). 130.
IX
The Romance: I
To most people today the word romance1 suggests a love story, and because
some medieval romances involve famous love storiessuch as those of
Lancelot and Guinevere, Tristan and Iseult, Floris and Blancheflourthey
assume that a love interest is a necessary ingredient in the romance of the
Middle Ages. This is not strictly true. One has only to think of the romances
of Alexander, Richard the Lion-Hearted, and many lesser figures to realize
that medieval romance could get along very well with little or no love element.
The basic material is knightly activity and adventure, and we may best put
the emphasis in the right place if we define the medieval romances as a story
of adventurefictitious and frequently marvelous or super-naturalin verse
or prose. Except for the few romances in which a love story is the main
feature,2 love, if it enters into the narrative at all, is either subordinated to the
adventure (Erec, Yvain), or is incidental, as when a Saracen princess conceives
a desperate passion for the hero (Bevis of Hampton), or is used as a motivating
force, an excuse for the adventures of the hero (Guy of Warwick). It may be
added that the earlier romances are in verse; those in prose are generally late.
The former ordinarily range in length from one thousand to six thousand
lines, with occasional productions running to nearly double this limit. The
commonest metres are the eight-syllable couplet and a variety of tail-rime
stanzas (aabccb, aaabcccb, and twelve-line stanzas of more elaborate pattern).
The romance in verse, in so far as it tends to be a narrative of heroic
adventure, has some things in common with the epic.3 But it has less unity of
action and the characters are not so well defined. Although occasional
romances have a simple and skilfully managed plot, many are little more than
1
The word romance comes from a Latin adverb romanice, meaning in the Roman manner (loqui
romanice, to speak in the Roman manner, i.e., speak colloquial Latin). In time, with the change of
Vulgar Latin into the various Romance languages, it came to mean more particularly French, and then
something written in French, especially something translated from Latin. Samson de Nanteuil calls his
metrical translation of the Proverbs of Solomon a romance. As was natural, however, the word came
gradually to designate the most popular type of French poem and hence a poem of this type in any
language. See Reinald Hoops, Der Begriff Romance in der mittelenglischen und frhneuenglischen
Literatur (Heidelberg, 1929; Anglistische Forschungen, No. 68).
2
The type is better represented in France, where courtly love enjoyed greater vogue. For a treatment
of these see Sarah F.Barrow, The Medieval Society Romances (1924; Columbia Univ. Studies in English
and Compar. Lit., No. 34).
3
For an interesting paper suggesting that romance is transplanted epic, which has undergone a
kind of sea-change in the passage, see N.E.Griffin, The Definition of Romance, PMLA, XXXVIII
(1923). 5070. For a stimulating discussion of the whole subject see W.P.Ker, Epic and Romance (2ed.,
1908).
173
Definition
Characteristics
174
An
Arisocratic
Genre
English
Romances
Late
The
Matters
of
Medieval
Romance
a loose succession of incidents strung on a biographical thread. The characters

of medieval romance are poorly differentiated. They are types rather than
individuals. The hero conforms to a pattern, that of the ideal knight, and
within the pattern there is little room for individual variation. Lancelot,
Tristan, Gawainthey are hardly distinguishable, although we can
occasionally recognize Lancelot by catching a glimpse of Guinevere in the
background, or Tristan if he is contriving a secret meeting with Iseult. Since
the romance deals for the most part with types and the hero is himself an
idealized type, the action likewise does not admit of great variety. There is
only one way in which a knight may prove himself worthy to be the hero of
the story and that is by showing himself superior to other knights. Now the
ways in which one may dispose of an opponent in tournament or battle are
limited, and it is therefore not surprising that the poet occasionally foists in a
giant or a dragon to lend variety to his heros adventures. Yet in spite of the
obvious weaknesses of the genreweakness in plot, faintness of
characterization, sameness of incidentit is surprising how interesting the
individual romance, taken by itself, contrives to be.4
The romance in its beginning was an aristocratic type appealing to the
tastes of the upper class. As long as French remained the normal language of
the English ruling classes the romances that circulated in England were French
and those written in England were written in French. This means that romances
in English are not to be expected until English begins to displace French as
the language of polite society, that is, until the middle of the thirteenth century.
There is only one English romance that can be dated with certainty earlier
than 1250. Unfortunately by this time the romance in France, and indeed in
Europe generally, had passed its prime. The great creative period of medieval
romance was the twelfth century,5 and the beginning of the thirteenth. By the
end of the latter century the type begins to deteriorate. Poets, chewing over
the old straw, are driven to desperate measures to make it seem more palatable.
Overstraining after effect replaces the easy confidence of a Chrtien de Troyes
or Gottfried von Strassburg. Most of our English romances belong to the
fourteenth century and nearly all of them are translations or adaptations
from French originals. Yet while they seldom come up to the level of medieval
romance at its best, it must not be thought that they are quite what readers of
Chaucer might infer from Sir Thopas.
While medieval romance was at the height of its popularity a Continental
poet, Jean Bodel, wrote in his Chanson des Saisnes:
Nen sont que trois materes a nul home entendant
De France, et de Bretaigne, et de Rome la grant.
4
Years from now any one curious about our current mystery stories will probably find in them a
similar tendency to run to type, yet the individual story manages to be interesting.
5
The romance is a product of the twelfth century, along with the troubadour lyric, the great
cathedrals, scholastic philosophy, and other evidences of the creative mind at work in this renaissance
period. See Haskins, as above.
THE ROMANCE: I
175
It has been customary ever since to speak of medieval romance under these
headingsthe Matter of Rome, by which is meant romances based on classical
history and legend, the Matter of France, meaning stories of Charlemagne
and his peers, and the Matter of Britain or the Arthurian cycle. This is a fairly
adequate statement of aristocratic taste on the Continent, but it needs to be
supplemented in one direction for England. It leaves out of account a group
of romances of great interest. These are the romances concerned with native
English heroes or with a figure like Havelok the Dane, whose fortunes are
tied up with England and whose principal adventures take place in the island.
Later it would have been necessary for a comprehensive classification to take
cognizance of many romances of Eastern and other exotic themes.
i. The Matter of England

It is possible to suppose that when the English language spread to the upper
class it was adopted first by those whose interests were less closely bound up
with the Continent and who were more ready to identify themselves with the
people among whom they lived. And it may equally well be that having come
to look upon England as their country of first allegiance they were interested
in stories about. English worthies. At all events, we cannot help noticing that
most of the romances, and certainly the most popular, written in English
before 1300 were concerned with English subjects and that only after 1300
do we find stories of the Charlemagne and Arthurian cycles or of classical
legend being adapted for a public that now preferred its entertainment in
English rather than in French.6
The two earliest of these romances, it would seem, are King Horn and
Havelok the Dane. The former has often been placed as far back as 1225,
but the basis for so early a date is very questionable. We must distinguish
here, as in the case of Havelok, between the underlying legend and the
romance in its English form. A more conservative date about 1250 for the
English versions of both stories seems safer. King Horn7 relates the adventures
of a prince who is driven out of his country by pagan invaders, but in the
end wins back his possessions and thronethe so-called exile and return
motif. During the heros youth his fathers kingdom of Suddene (in
southwestern Scotland) is invaded by people called Saracens in the poem,
but apparently Scandinavians. With a dozen companions he is set adrift in
a boat which carries him to the Mull of Galloway. 8 Here he is loved by
6
The only exceptions to this generalization are Floris and Blancheflour, of the first half of the
thirteenth century, and Arthur and Merlin and King Alisaunder, which may have been written shortly
before 1300.
7
Editions by J.Hall (Oxford, 1901), G.H.McKnight (1901; EETS, 14), and T.Wissmann (Strassburg,
1881; Quellen u. Forschungen, XLV). The text of this and a number of other romances discussed in the
present chapter can be read conveniently in W.H.French and C.B.Hale, Middle English Metrical
Romances (1930). For an excellent discussion of the date, versions, etc., of King Horn see Laura
Hibbard, Medieval Romance in England (1924), pp. 83102. See also W.H.French, Essays on King
Horn (Ithaca, 1940).
8
The most convincing attempt to explain the hitherto baffling geography of the romance is
that of Walter Oliver, King Horn and Suddene, PMLA, XLVI (1931). 102114. In this connection
King
Horn
176
Havelok
the kings daughter Rimenhild, but he is forced through the treachery of a

companion to leave the country. After the lovers have sworn to remain faithful
for the usual seven years he goes to Ireland. He fights valiantly for the Irish
king and remains in his service until recalled by a message from Rimenhild.
With the help of Irish soldiers he returns in time to prevent her marriage to
an unwelcome suitor. The same warriors help him to regain his own kingdom,
whereupon he comes back and marries the much harassed but faithful and
romantically patient lady. This simple action is built up with enough good
fighting, dangers, narrow escapes for Rimenhild, and conduct worthy of both
hero and heroine to make it a lively and satisfying tale.9
The romance of Havelok 10 has a somewhat more artfully constructed
plot. The heroine is an English princess named Goldborough, left an orphan
at the tender age of two. While she is growing up, the country is ruled by a
regent named Godrich, who has promised her father not only to preserve the
kingdom for her but to marry her to the best, fairest, and strongest man
living. Instead he shuts her up in Dover Castle. This constitutes the first part
of the story. In part two we make the acquaintance of Havelok, who is in
somewhat like fashion the victim of treachery. When his father, the King of
Denmark, dies the boy is given over to a trusted councilor named Godard,
who rewards the confidence placed in him by arranging with a fisherman
named Grim to have Havelok drowned. A luminous mark on the boys
shoulder and a bright light which issues from his mouth, however, tell Grim
as plainly as words that he is the royal heir. So the fisherman flees with his
family and Havelok to England and settles near the mouth of the Humber at
a place afterwards called Grimsby. There with his sons he pursues his
occupation of fishing, and Havelok sells his basket of fish like the rest. In
time the lad grows big and very strong. When a famine occurs he is unwilling
to be a burden on Grim and seeks employment in Lincoln, the nearest large
city. He gets a job with the Earl of Lincolns cook and is a great favorite with
everyone.
It is necessary now for the poet to find some way of bringing the hero and
cf. the resemblances to the legend of St. Cuthbert pointed out by Irene P.McKeehan, The Book of the
Nativity of St. Cuthbert. PMLA, XLVIII (1933). 981999.
9
The story is treated in a later English version, Horn Childe and Maiden Rimnild, found in the
Auchinleck MS (printed in an appendix in Hall and by Caro, below), and in ballads telling the episode
of Horns return to save Rimenhild (Hind Horn, Child, No. 17). It was adapted in French by Geoffrey
de la Tour Landri and in this form was turned into English prose in the fifteenth-century King Ponthus
and the Fair Sidone (ed. F.J.Mather, Jr., PMLA, XII (1897). 1150). The origin of the legend and the
relation of the versions, English and French, are much disputed questions. In addition to the references
given in a previous note see especially T.Wissmann, King Horn: Untersuchungen(Strassburg, 1876;
Qucllen u. Forschungen, XVI); J.Caro, Kleine Publikationen aus der Auchinleck-Hs: Horn Childe
and Maiden Rimnild, ESt, XII (1889). 323366 (text and study); O.Hartenstein, Studien zur Hornsage
(Heidelberg, 1902; Kieler Studien, IV); W.H.Schofield, The Story of Horn and Rimenhild, PMLA,
XVIII (1903). 183; Paul Leidig, Studien zu King Horn (Borna-Leipzig, 1927); Leslie G.Burgevin,
The Origin and Development of the Saga of King Horn, Harvard Univ. Summaries of Theses,
1931, pp. 212215.
10
Edited by W.W.Skeat (revised by K.Sisam, Oxford, 1915), and by F.Holthausen 3ed., Heidelberg,
1928); earlier ed. by Skeat in EETSES, 4 (1868).
THE ROMANCE: I
177
heroine together. A parliament which Earl Godrich convenes at Lincoln offers

a convenient excuse. In the festivities called forth by the occasion Havelok
wins a prize and much local fame by putting the stone twelve feet farther
than any other man. When Godrich hears of this record-breaking achievement
he has an idea. He has sworn to marry Goldborough to the best, fairest, and
strongest man in England. He will marry her to Havelok, the kitchen knave!
Goldborough is forced to submit to the marriage, outrageous as it seems to
her. However, one night as she lies beside Havelok, bewildered and somewhat
resentful, she sees the luminous mark on his shoulder and is told by an angel
that she is married to a kings son. Filled with joy, she kisses him. This
unexpected attention wakes him up from a dream in which he has seen all
Denmark and England subject to him. With the help of Grims three sons he
invades Denmark and wins the support of a Danish noble named Ubbe,
especially when Ubbe discovers the great light that issues from Haveloks
mouth as he sleeps. It is of 107 candle-power. Havelok regains his kingdom,
conquers England, and rewards all who have been good to him, especially
the Earl of Lincolns cook. He and Goldborough live a hundred years and
have many children. As a final word the poet begs his hearers to say a
paternoster for him that hath made the rime and therefore sat up many nights.
It has seemed well to tell the story of Havelok at some length to show that
English romances are not all formless and that authors of medieval romance
could occasionally construct a good plot. Notwithstanding its nave elements
suggestive of the fairy tale Havelok the Dane is a well-planned story. As in
King Horn, the emphasis is on the adventure. Neither romance has much of
the glamour or sophistication of courtly society. In fact Havelok is almost
democratic in tone. There is respect for honest labor, the hero is associated
most of the time with common people, and such people and their activities
play a large part in the story. His great triumph is not in knightly competition
but in putting the stone. The charm of his character is not revealed in courtly
graces, but in homely and natural virtuesa cheerful, sunny disposition which
makes the children and the cook like him, a readiness to accept without
question his humble lot as a fisher boy and scullery knave. Though both King
Horn and Havelok are based on earlier French narratives,11 they seem to
reflect the spirit of the English middle class, or to be the work of minstrels
little acquainted with the ways of the court.12 It is among such that we might
well look for the authors of romances at a time when the upper class was just
beginning to adopt English in numbers. While dating these two romances c.
1250, we must allow for minor revisions at least in Havelok shortly after
1300.13
11
For the French versions see above, pp. 138, 141.

Defects in one of the MSS show that both romances were copied from an original with only
twenty lines to a page. Such a book, if 3X4 inches in size and composed of 120 leaves, would have
held Horn and Havelok and been very convenient for a minstrel.
13
England is twice described as extending from Roxburgh to Dover, which could har dly
be said until Roxbur gh became a bor der for tr ess in 1296 (J.W.Hales, Folia Litteraria, pp.
12
Bourgeois
Elements
178
Guy of
Warwick
Its
Popularity
Enjoying the widest popularity and longest life accorded to any English
romances were two stories written about 1300, Guy of Warwick and Bevis
of Hampton. The former has been preserved in four versions ranging in length
from seven to twelve thousand lines.14 It is very typical of romances in which,
everything is subordinated to adventure. It consists of the individual encounters
of the hero with an endless succession of adversaries. The excuse is love.
Felice, daughter of the Earl of Warwick, will not consider marriage with the
hero, who is only the son of her fathers steward, until he proves his worth in
the field. After many victories Guy returns hopefully, only to be told by his
sweetheart that she will marry a mere knight only if he is the best knight in
the world. Guys mingled disappointment and unquenchable hope are the
incentive for a wide variety of additional combats and adventures, after which
the rather difficult mistress is satisfied and the marriage takes place. Here the
romance would have had to end and perhaps originally did end. But an excuse
was found for continuing it. After a few months of married life Guys
conscience hurts. All his achievements have been for a selfish end, to win the
love of Felice. He feels that he should do something for God, fight against the
infidel in the cause of the true faith. Accordingly with Felices consent he sets
out on a third series of adventures, and when he returns he has little more
than time to withdraw from the world and compose his soul for death. This
part of the romance is reminiscent of the crusades, and the spirit of
renunciation and humility in which he spends his last days in his lonely cell
almost suggests the possibility of a monkish hand in this part of the story.
By the year 1410 the fame of Guy of Warwick had spread even to the
Holy Land where the Sultans lieutenant remarked that they had the story
in books in their own language. In England it was published by the earliest
English printers and in the Elizabethan period was made into ballads and
plays. In the seventeenth century it was told in poems of epic proportions
and was also adapted to the tastes and purses of the plebeian citizenry in
the form of chapbooks that lasted on into the eighteenth century, when it
became the object of antiquarian interest.15 Such popularity was no doubt
due in part to the belief that the romance had an historical foundation. The
story is laid in the reign of Athelstan (925940), the grandson of King
Alfred. In the romance Guy returns to England in time to take a leading
part in Athelstans fight with the Danes. Guys fight in single combat with
Colbrand, the Danish champion, was accepted as fact for a long time and
was told in a number of chronicles as sober truthso well did the storyteller
3039). The only Parliament held at Lincoln was in 1300. Such details suggest that the story was
brought up to date shortly after the turn of the century.
14
A French romance of Gui de Warewic, earlier than the English, exists in thirteen MSS (ed. Alfred
Ewert, 2v, Paris, 193233; CFMA, 7475). The English romance, in various versions, is edited by
J.Zupitza (187591; EETSES, 25, 26, 42, 49, 59).
15
See Ronald S.Crane, The Vogue of Guy of Warwick from the Close of the Middle Ages to the
Romantic Revival, PMLA, XXX (1915). 125194. The larger aspects of the survival of medieval
romance are studied in the same authors dissertation (Univ. of Pennsylvania), on which the above
article is in part based.
THE ROMANCE: I
179
do his work. Patriotism thus combined with interest in the story to keep the
romance alive long after better romances were forgotten.
Equally famous were the adventures of Bevis of Southampton. We have
romances, often in several versions, from France, Italy, Scandinavia, and the
Netherlands, to say nothing of two in Celtic and several in Slavonic. The
story begins with a variant of the Hamlet theme. Beviss mother plots her
husbands death and afterwards marries the murderer. Bevis is sold to foreign
merchants, and in time is taken into the service of Ermin, King of the Saracens.
Ermins daughter Josian falls in love with him and most of his adventures
grow out of his efforts to maintain his reputation as a Christian knight amidst
pagan envy and treachery, or else to defend Josian against her Saracen suitor.
In the end marriage and the recovery of his inheritance give him twenty years
of happiness before he dies. Bevis of Hampton is not a remarkable example
of medieval romance. It is made up of stock motifs and episodesthe January
and May marriage of Beviss parents, the child ordered to be put to death but
spared through the pity of the servant, the hero sold to heathen merchants,
the ubiquitous Saracen princess, fights with giants, wild boars, dragons, the
wicked steward who tries to steal the credit for the heros exploit, as in Tristan
and Iseult, etc. The articulation of the episodes is loose and inexpert. What
gives the romance its chief distinction is its exuberance, its racy, buoyant
style, and the spirit of broad humor in which it is written. A thirty-foot
giant whom Bevis fights was among his own people so small that everybody
picked on him. They called him the dwarf and he was forced to run away.
When Bevis fells him and is on the point of cutting off his head, Josian
suggests sparing him that he may be her page. When Josian is baptized they
decide to baptize the giant too. A special font is constructed, but when the
bishop attempts to push him in he leaps out and cries, Priest, wilt thou
drown me?I am too big to be Christian. The author wrote with evident
gusto, which has not always been appreciated. His learned German editor
says, The strain in which this work is written is serious, even severe. 16
Richard Cur de Lion17 is one instance in which history really furnished
a hero and a series of adventures adequate and ready to the poets hand for
the purposes of romance. Richard I as a ruler would not have inspired
much enthusiasm among the English. He looked upon his office as a means
to an end, and spent only six months of his ten-year reign in England. But
his adventurous nature, his daring exploits and personal triumphs as the
leader of the Third Crusade, his captivity in Germany, the picturesque
circumstances of his death, and the magnanimity with which he treated the
fanatical warrior whose bolt had struck him were a source of patriotic
pride and popular admiration which increased as reality passed into legend.
The author of the romance has a general idea of the facts in Richards life, but
16
Ed. E.Klbing (188594; EETSES, 46, 48, 65). For the Anglo-Norman version see above, p.
142.
17
Edited from all the MSS by Karl Brunner, Der mittelenglische Versroman ber Richard Lwenherz
(Vienna, 1913; Wiener Beitrge, XLII).
Bevis of
Hampton
Richard
Cur de
Lion
180
Athelston
he does not hesitate to alter history to suit his purpose. He has Richards
captivity precede the crusade and in order to explain it, has Richard journey
as a pilgrim to the Holy Land first. It would seem that his knowledge of
history was somewhat sketchy and confused, but he was a storyteller and not
a historian, and did not feel called upon to aim at scholarly accuracy. Moreover
he introduced legendary elements freely and these are at times the most
interesting part of his narrative. Such an element is the episode during Richards
captivity in which his captors try to bring about his death by admitting a lion
to his cell. He meets the lion with a tremendous kick and as the animal opens
its jaws wide in a howl of pain Richard thrusts his arm down the lions
throat, tearing out its heart and various other organs, in fact all that he
found, says the storyteller. Then taking the heart still warm, he goes into the
hall, dips it into the salt and eats it before the astonished court. Thus the poet
accounts for his nickname, Lion-Hearted. It is a romance of adventure,
historical and pseudo-historical. The author refers to his source as French,
but the strong English bias and open scorn expressed for the French king put
its English origin beyond any doubt. It dates from about 1300.
What Richard Cur de Lion does on a large scale the romance of
Athelston18 does on a small. In some 800 lines a poet of about 1350 has
constructed a purely fictitious story about a king who bore a name famous in
Old English history.19 He has used scraps of history, legend, folklore, and
commonplaces of romance. How he has woven together this heterogeneous
assortment of ideas will be seen from the footnote below.20 It will suffice here
to remark that by a shameless disregard for historical truth he has devised a
well-knit and highly effective plot. The romance has many qualities of the
balladtags, and repetitions, and commonplaces, to say nothing of the
opening in which the four messengers meet on the edge of a wood and without
18
Ed. A.M.Trounce, Athelston: A Middle English Romance (1933; also 1951; EETS, 224).
See the account of the Battle of Brunanburh, above, p. 56.
20
Athelston meets three other messengers and swears blood-brotherhood with them. On this motif
see G.H.Gerould, Social and Historical Reminiscences in the Middle English Athelston, ESt, XXXVI
(1906). 193208. Upon becoming king he makes his companions respectively, Archbishop of Canterbury,
the Earl of Dover, and the Earl of Stane, giving also to the last named his sister in marriage. Believing
the jealous representations of Dover, he sends for the Earl of Stane and his family, ostensibly to confer
knighthood on the two sons. Instead he throws them into prison, and when the Queen begs him on her
knees to give them a hearing he becomes enraged and kicks her, killing his unborn heir. On the kicked
Queen see A.C.Baugh, A Source for the Middle English Romance, Athelston, PMLA, XLIV (1929).
377382. The Queen appeals to the Archbishop, who similarly incurs Athelstons anger. But the
Archbishop excommunicates the King and puts all England under an interdict. This incident recalls
the story of Thomas Becket; see Gerould, as above, and Paul Brown, The Development of the Legend
of Thomas Becket (Philadelphia, 1930). The King agrees to permit the accused noble and his family to
have a trial by ordeal. They must walk over nine red-hot stones. This is the story of Queen Emma and
the plow-shares; see L.A.Hibbard, Athelston, a Westminster Legend, PMLA, XXXVI (1921). 223
244. As the countess successfully completes her part of the ordeal, she is seized with the pains of
childbirth and is delivered of a son. The King, now fully convinced and penitent, adopts the child in
place of the heir which his wicked rage had destroyed. The child is said to be Saint Edmund, king and
martyr. This last touch is a perversion of history amounting to genius. Athelston, the hero of Brunanburh,
was succeeded by Edmund. Edmund was a younger brother, however, not a nephew, and Edmund
Martyr lived a century before!
19
THE ROMANCE: I
181
explanation proceed to swear blood-brotherhood with one another. It is

probably the work of a minstrel, but the humiliation of the king by the power
of the Church and the prominence given to moral issues has been cited as
evidence that the story was written under ecclesiastical influence.21
All these romances, it will be seen, capitalize upon the interest in native
figures, real or imaginary. By the time most of them were written the habit of
writing romances in English was thoroughly established, and poets were ready
to go outside the English circle for their themes.
ii. The Matter of Rome

Medieval romances based on classical stories generally had to do with one of
four subjects: Alexander the Great, the Trojan war, the siege of Thebes, and
the adventures of neas. All four were made into long French romances in
the twelfth century, and all four had English offspring, but only two enjoyed
genuine popularity in England. These were the stories of Alexander and of
Troy, with Alexander well out in front.
All popular medieval treatments of Alexander 22 go back ultimately to a
romantic biography in Greek prose, written at Alexandria some time before
200 A.D. 23 The author, who is known to modern scholarship as
pseudoCallisthenes, doubtless embodied in his account current legends
concerning Alexanders birth designed to make the founder of his native city
an Egyptian. This amazing story is one of the two features that insured the
popularity of the work in later times. The other is the extended treatment of
Alexanders travels, especially in India, with its multitude of strange sights,
marvels of nature, and wonderful experiences.24 Pseudo-Callisthenes was
translated into Latin c. 300 A.D. by Julius Valerius,25 and in an abridgement
of the ninth century circulated widely.26 Finally, about 950, the Greek was
again translated into Latin by one Leo, Archpresbyter of Naples. This version,
generally known as the Historia de Preliis 27 (i.e., the wars of Alexander),
enjoyed still greater popularity. From one or another of these Latin derivatives
of pseudo-Callisthenes a great number of accounts in the vernaculars of
western Europe was composed. The oldest is a Provenal poem of the
eleventh century by Alberic of Pisanon, of which only a fragment is
preserved. It was, however, adapted in French about 1160 in lines of ten syllables,
and altered and continued toward the end of the century in twelvesyllable
21
Wells, p. 25.
The most extended treatment of the Alexander legend, Paul Meyer, Alexandre le Grand dans la
littrature franaise du moyen ge (Paris, 1886), is now somewhat antiquated. For an excellent brief
discussion see the introduction to F.P.Magoun, Jr., The Gests of King Alexander of Macedon (Cambridge,
Mass., 1929).
23
Edited (one recension) by W.Kroll, Historia Alexandri Magni (Berlin, 1926).
24
This feature of the story was already known in England in Old English times. See above, p. 104
for a mention of the Letter of Alexander to Aristotle and the Wonders of the East.
25
Res Gestae Alexandri Macedonis, ed. B.Kbler (Leipzig, 1888).
26
It is often called the Zacher Epitome because it was edited by J.Zacher (Halle, 1867). It was
incorporated in condensed form by Vincent of Beauvais in his Speculum Historiale (c. 1250).
27
Ed. F.Pfister, Der Alexanderroman des Archipresbyters Leo (Heidelberg, 1913). It is translated
in English (omitting Book II) in Margaret Schlauch. Medieval Narrative (1928).
22
The
Legend of
Alexander
182
King
Alisaunder
Alexander
A and B
verses. This later Roman dAlexandre 28 was the standard form in which the
story circulated in French. There was, however, another French poem written
in England (c. 1280) by Thomas of Kent. It was based on the Zacher Epitome
and is known as the Roman de Toute Chevalerie.29 From it is derived the best
known English romance on the subject, King Alisaunder.30
King Alisaunder runs to 8000 lines (in four-stress couplets). Since it is found
in a manuscript of 133040 it cannot be later than this and is probably to be
dated c. 1300. It is divided by the author into two parts. The first tells the story
of Nectanebus, the Egyptian king who exercises his magic on Olympias, the
wife of Philip of Macedon, and becomes the father of her child, Alexander. It
also relates at length Alexanders military exploits, treating with especial fullness
his triumph over Darius. The second part deals with Alexanders conquest of
India and the multitude of fabulous creatures and terrifying experiences which
he met with in the course of his extensive travels. While the romance is clearly
intended for oral delivery, as numerous remarks indicate, it is the work of a bookish
man. He frequently appeals for authority to his sources. On one occasion, he
declines to relate an incident which he finds in his French geste because it is
contradicted by the scholarship (lettrure) on the subject.31 In another place he
supplies a gap in his French source from another work in Latin,32 and once he
speaks of the strange people in Egypt in oure bokes as we findith, where he
seems to identify himself with those who have and use booksclerks. Alexander
romances in general descend by a literary rather than a popular tradition, and
nowhere is this better illustrated than in the English King Alisaunder.
The same thing is true of the two fragments of a romance in alliterative
verse known as Alexander A and Alexander B.33 In the former the author
is clearly not dependent upon any previous romance in French. He tells of
the ancestry and conquests of Philip of Macedon through 450 lines taken
from the Latin of Orosius because, as he remarks, he could not find any
book when he began to write that told of Alexanders birth. But apparently
he later got hold of a copy of the Historia de Preliis and-so he plunges at
once into the story of Nectanebus. He has hardly described the youthful
feats of Alexander when the fragment breaks off. Practically the whole of
Alexander B (1139 lines) is given over to the exchange of letters between
Alexander and Dindimus discussing the Brahmin way of life. The author
28
Ed. H.Michelant (Stuttgart, 1846) and E.C.Armstrong, et. al. (Princeton, 1937; Elliott
Monographs, Vols. 36 and 37). The popularity of this version is responsible for our still calling the
twelve-syllable line an Alexandrine.
29
Still unpublished. See above, p. 141.
30
In H.Weber, Metrical Romances of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Centuries (Edinburgh,
1810), Vol. I, superseded by ed. of G.V.Smithers (2V, 19527; EETS, 227, 237).
31
Cf. lines 351121.
32
This batail destuted [lacking] is,

In the French, wel y-wis,
Therefore Y have, it to colour,
Borowed of the Latyn autour, (lines 21992202.)
33
The best edition is that of F.P.Magoun, Jr., The Gests of King Alexander of Macedon (Cambridge,
Mass., 1929), who believes that B is a continuation rather than a part of A.
THE ROMANCE: I
183
handles the alliterative line with apparent ease, drops into dialogue when
necessary, and tells his story fluently. He wrote in the West Midlands and, as
nearly as we can judge, in the middle third of the fourteenth century.34
Next to the story of Alexander the most popular subject for romances of
classical theme was the fall of Troy, and this in spite of the fact that Homer
was completely unknown to western Europe in the Middle Ages. The Middle
Ages derived their knowledge of the Troy story from two short prose accounts
translated from late Greek. These went under the names of Dares and Dictys
respectively.35 The two accounts are usually found together in medieval
manuscripts and although involving some duplication each includes matter
not found in the other. The combination gave a fairly complete, if wholly
prosaic, account of events from the story of Jason and the Golden Fleece
through the particulars of the siege to the return of the Greeks and the death
of Ulysses at the hands of his son Telegonus. The first vernacular treatment
of this material was the work of a Norman-French poet, Benot de SainteMore, whose Roman de Troie 36 runs to 30,000 verses. It is a spirited and
effective narrative, but not a little of its fame today is due to the elaborate
treatment of an episode that here makes its first appearance in literature
the Troilus and Briseida (Cressida) story.37 A century later Benots verse was
turned into Latin prose by a Sicilian judge, Guido della Colonna, as the
Historia Destructions Troiae (1287).38 In these two forms the story had a
wide circulation and passed into later vernacular versions.
The earliest Troy romance in English is the Seege of Troye, a poem of
about two thousand lines.39 There is frequent appeal to the lordings to
listen and it is obviously intended for minstrel production. It was designed
to be recited or read in two installments, for the minstrel pauses just half
34
Other Alexander romances survive. One in alliterative verse of the early fifteenth century is
known as Alexander C. It runs to nearly 5700 lines and lacks a few leaves at the end. Another preserved
in a Cambridge MS is in stanzas of alternate rime (ed. Rosskopf, Erlangen, 1911). A prose romance
running to about 100 pages is in the Thornton MS, 143040. Two long Scottish poems, written in the
fifteenth century are mentioned below (p. 300).
35
Dares Phrygius, De Excidio Trojae Historia (sixth century), and Dictys Cretensis, Ephemeris de
Historia Belli Trojani (fourth century). Dares and Dictys represent themselves as having fought in
their respective armies, Dares on the side of the Trojans and Dictys on the side of the Greeks. Both
claims, of course, are fraudulent. They were made to give the authority of eye-witnesses to works
written centuries later. See N.E.Griffin, Dares and Dictys: An Introduction to the Study of Medieval
Versions of the Story of Troy (Baltimore, 1907).
36
It was written in the second half of the twelfth century, possibly about 115560, and dedicated
to the English queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine. This is the date arrived at by its modern editor, L.Constans,
Le Roman de Troie, par Benot de Sainte-Maure (6v, Paris, 190412; SATF). For a slightly later date
(after 1184) see the argument of F.E.Guyer, The Chronology of the Earliest French Romances, MP,
XXVI (1929). 257277.
37
The love story begins at line 13, 261 and accompanies the main narrative at intervals to the
death of Troilus (lines 21, 397 ff). It serves to fill in the uneventful periods of truce and adds an
important element of variety to the narrative. It is not thought that Benot invented this love story, but
if he followed an expanded Dares, as some believe, his source has disappeared.
38
Ed. N.E.Griffin, Guido de Columnis: Historia Destructions Troiae (Cambridge, Mass., 1936).
39
Mary E.Barnicle, The Seege or Batayle of Troye (London, 1927; EETS, 172). See the valuable
study by G.Hofstrand, The Seege of Troye (Lund, 1936). and C.H.A.Wager, The Seege of Troy (1899),
which is still important.
The
Roman de
Troie
Seege of
Troye
184
Other
Treatments
Thebes
and
neas
way through for an intermissionRest we now a litel peceand suggests

that the company fyl e cuppe and mak ous glad. The original poem from
which the existing manuscripts descend was written in the northeast Midlands
at the beginning of the fourteenth century and follows the plan of Dares with
additions from Benot and commonplaces of classical tradition. But in order
to cover the ground from the adventures of Jason and the Golden Fleece to
the destruction of Troy and the triumphant return of the Greeks, it is necessary
for the poet to hurry from episode tc episode without time to pause for those
particulars and details that lend interest to a story. Very different is the Laud
Troy Book,40 which covers the same ground but was written to be read.
Apparently the work of a cleric, it fills more than 18,000 verses of considerable
fluency. It is somewhat older than the existing MS and dates from about
1400. To the latter half of the fourteenth century belongs also the Gest
Historialee of the Destruction of Troy, a poem in 14,000 alliterative verses.41
It is a product of the Allitera tive Revival in the north. The Troy story seems
to have enjoyed considerable popularity in Scotland. Extensive fragments of
a version attributed to the Scottish poet Barbour have been preserved,
imbedded in MSS of Lydgates Troy Book.42
Classical times and the Middle Ages took a strange interest in the unnatural
story of dipus and his marriage to his own mother. When his sons quarreled
over the right to rule Thebes and the party of Polynices laid siege to the city,
the opportunity existed for an epic narrative, comparable to that which
described the siege of Troy. The Virgilian epic, the Thebaid, by Statius, a
Roman poet of the Silver Age, gave western Europe such a treatment. Either
the Thebaid or an epitome of it was made into a French poem in the twelfth
century called the Roman de Thebes, and this in turn became the basis of
other romances. The only English poem on the subject was Lydgates Siege of
Thebes, discussed below.43 The story of neas is practically unrepresented in
English 44 until Caxton translated a French prose romance in his Eneydos
(1490), although it was available to the English upper classes in the French
Roman dEneas. It is apparent, therefore, that the stories of Alexander and
of Troy were the only themes in the Matter of Rome that showed any real
vitality in medieval England.
40
So called because the unique MS in which it is preserved was once in the possession of Archbishop
Laud. Edited by J.E.Wlfing (19023; EETS, 121122).
41
EETS. 39 and 56 (186974).
42
For Lydgate, see below, p. 296. For treatments in prose see p. 301.
43
Chaucers Knights Tale treats an episode loosely attached to the Thebes story. So too are the
Anglo-Norman romances Ipomedon and Prothesilaus mentioned on p. 141.
44
Chaucer tells the story of Dido in the House of Fame and more briefly in the Legend of Good
Women.
X
The Romance: II
iii. The Matter of France
When we turn to the Matter of France we are met by a slight anomaly.
Considering the Continental possessions and the long and close association
of the English nobility with France, one might expect considerable interest in
a body of legends centering in the French court and in important Carolingian
families. Instead we find only limited representation of this great collection
of stories, and those which are found in English versions seem to be written
without special enthusiasm. It would appear that the political rivalry between
the two countries which had developed by the time romances in any number
were being written in English had dampened the interest in material which
centered in the doings of French personages. In any case the national appeal
which such stories had in France was lacking in England.
The French chansons de geste, which included more than one hundred
poems, were recognized not long after 1200 as falling into three general
groups.1 The most famous is the geste du roi, the epics more or less directly
connected with Charlemagne, in many of which he appears as the champion
of Christendom in wars against the infidel. Of these the best known is the
Chanson de Roland. A second group is concerned with his struggles with his
vassals. The epics of this group constitute the geste de Doon de Mayence, so
called from the supposed ancestor of the rebels. The third concerns the
adventures and conquests of William of Orange and members of his family.
This group likewise takes its name from the legendary progenitor of the family
and is known as the geste de Garin de Monglane. While each of these branches
of the French epic has many points of interest, not all are represented in
English. Indeed the only Charlemagne romances that have come to us in
English verse belong to the cycle of the king, the geste du roi.2
1
The classification is that of Bertran de Bar-sur-Aube, the author of two such poems, Girart de
Vienne and Aymeri de Narbonne. In the former (after 1205) he says:
Not que trois gestes en France la garnie
Du roy de France est la plus seignorie,
Et lautre apres, bien est droiz qui jeu die,
Fu de Doon a la barbe florie,
Cil de Maience qui molt ot baronnie
La tierce geste, qui molt fist a prisier,
Fu de Garin de Monglenne au vis fier, (lines 1147.)
2
This is not the place to enter into the vexed question of the origin of the French epic.
The most popular explanation in recent years is that of Joseph Bdier, Les Lgendes piques
185
Chanson
de Geste
186
Song of
Roland
The
Ferumbras
Group
Among these the Middle English Song of Roland3 stands somewhat apart.
Preserved in a single MS, it tells the famous story of Rolands last stand in 1049
four-stress lines rimed in couplets. When it breaks off Roland is just about to blow
the blast on his horn that will summon Charlemagne. In spite of its rough
versification and many careless rimes it manages a monotonous succession of
individual combats with vigor and considerable variety. The poem naturally suffers
by comparison with the great French epic on which it is based, but it does not
entirely deserve the harsh words which it usually receives. Except for the late Rauf
Coilyear (Ralph the Collier),4 in which Charlemagne incognito is entertained
by a peasant, with humorous consequences, the remaining Charlemagne romances
fall into two classes, a Ferumbras group and an Otuel group.
The Ferumbras group treats the incidents found in two French chansons
de geste, the Destruction de Rome and Fierabras, which in versions differing
but slightly from those that are preserved seem to be the direct sources of
the English romances. The Sowdone [i.e., Sultan] of Babylone5 tells first
how Laban (usually Balan) with the help of his son Ferumbras, sacks Rome,
gets possession of the cross, the crown of thorns, and the nails of the
Crucifixion, and sends them to Spain. The second part covers rapidly the
incidents more fully treated in Sir Ferumbras.6 Here Charlemagnes army,
having come to Spain to punish the Saracens and recover the sacred relics,
is met by Ferumbras, a formidable knight twenty feet tall. He is conquered
in single combat by Oliver and becomes Christian, thereafter fighting on
the Christian side. Oliver, on his way back to camp, is taken captive by a
(4V, Paris, 190813; 2ed., 191421). Recognizing in many of the chansons de geste the prominent notice
taken of churches and monasteries along the great pilgrim routes of the Middle Ages, he suggested that
these churches furnished the jongleurs with historical facts and traditions to be worked up into poems. In
this way any claim to prominence which a church had because of the historic importance of its founder,
the possession of the tomb or relics of a heroic figure, or the like, would be enhanced and more widely
disseminated. The acceptance of this theory as a comprehensive explanation of the origin of the chanson
de geste is not unattended by difficulties, although as a method of accounting for individual poems it is
at times very convincing. Various critiques and correctives of Bdiers views are contained in the articles
of F.Lot, For a bibliography and summary of Lots position see E.J.Healy, The Views of Ferdinand Lot
on the Origins of the Old French Epic, SP, XXXVI (1939). 433465. The older work of Lon Gautier,
Les popes franaises (4V, 2ed, Paris, 187882) is still of value as a descriptive survey. For an excellent
brief account of the many theories of the origin of the Old French epic see K.Voretzsch, Introduction to
the Study of Old French Literature (Eng. trans., 1931), pp. 8999.
3
Edited by S.J.Heritage (1880; EETSES, 35).
4
Written in Scotland c. 1475 or slightly before. Edited by S.J.Herrtage (1882; EETSES, 39); William
H.Browne (Baltimore, 1903). See also H.M.Smyser, The Taill of Rauf Coilyear and Its Sources,
Harvard Studies & Notes in Phil. & Lit., XIV (1932). 135150.
5
Edited by Emil Hausknecht (1881; EETSES, 38). It is in quatrains of alternate three- and fourstress verses. For a discussion of its source see the careful study of H.M.Smyser, The Sowdon of
Babylon and Its Author, Harvard Studies & Notes in Phil. & Lit., XIII (1931). 185218, supplemented
and corrected by the same authors A New Manuscript of the Destruction de Rome and Fierabras,
ibid., XIV (1932). 339349.
6
Known as the Ashmole version to distinguish it from that in the Fillingham MS. The edition in
EETSES, 34 is printed in long lines which disguise its true metrical form. It is really in 10,540 verses,
of which the first 6820 are in quatrains (abab), the last 3720 in romance sixes (aab ccb). Fragments of
the authors original draft are preserved, written on the back of two documents belonging to the
diocese of Exeter at the end of the fourteenth century. The romance was apparently composed at about
the same time and place.
THE ROMANCE: II
187
Saracen force, and the greater part of the story grows out of his capture and
the circumstance that the Sultans beautiful daughter, Floripas, is in love with
another of Charlemagnes knights, Guy of Burgundy. Her determined and
resourceful personality plays a large part in the ultimate victory of the
Christians and the recovery of the relics. Needless to say, she receives her
reward in marriage to Guy, after being duly baptized. It is a pity that the
unique manuscript in which Sir Ferumbras is preserved has lost a leaf or two
at the beginning and end, for it is much the best of the English Charlemagne
romances. The author was a conscious artist and took obvious pains with his
work. It is full of effective scenes and nice touches. Incidentally it is almost
the only case in which any part of an English romance has come down in the
authors autograph. By comparison the recently recovered Fillingham
Firumbras7 seems lacking in distinction. The same incidents are treated more
briefly by one who seems to be telling a story without being a storyteller.
The Otuel group consists of five romances. Roland and Vernagu,8 in tailrime stanzas, is full of wild statements and childish exaggeration. The earliest
part relates the circumstances under which Charlemagne comes to the aid of
the Patriarch of Jerusalem and receives the crown of thorns, the arm of St.
Simeon, Our Ladys smock, and many other relics. His invasion of Spain is
like a triumphal march, after his prayers have caused the walls of one or two
stubborn cities to fall. The romance takes its name from the latter part in
which his douzepers are challenged by a forty-foot Saracen named Vernagu.
After Ogier and several other paladins who undertake to fight him are picked
up by Vernagu and carried off under his arm to prison, Roland disposes of
him although he barely escapes the same ignominious treatment. The romance
is incomplete, and as it breaks off amid the general rejoicing, it seems to be
about to proceed to the story of Otuel which we have in other Middle English
versions. The Sege of Melayne9 (Milan) may have been intended to form
another introduction to the Otuel story, although nothing corresponding to
it in French literature is known. It relates a very unhistorical incident but tells
its story well. Its most significant feature is the character of Archbishop Turpin,
who abandons his priestly robes and conducts himself with great credit on
the battlefield.
Three romances tell the story of Otuel proper. His reason for challenging
Roland is partly the fact that Vernagu, whom Roland had killed, was his
uncle. They all tell the same story with slight variations. Otuel in the midst
of his single combat with Roland is converted to Christianity when the
7
So called from the owner of the MS at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Lost for a hundred
years, it was acquired by the British Museum in 1907 (Add. MS 37, 492). Edited by Mary I.OSullivan
(1935; EETS, 198).
8
EETSES, 39. See Ronald N.Walpole, Charlemagne and Roland: A Study of the Source of Two
Middle English Metrical Romances, Roland and Vernagu and Otuel and Roland (Berkeley and Los
Angeles, 1944; Univ. of Calif. Pub. in Mod. Phil., XXI, No. 6).
9
EETSES, 35. It is in twelve-line tail-rime stanzas of the late fourteenth century. The dialect of the
original was northern, though it is preserved in a Midland copy.
The
Otuel
Group
188
Religious
Interest in
Charlemagne
Romance
Holy Ghost descends in the form of a dove and settles on his helmet. King
Charles welcomes him to his company and promises him the hand of his
daughter, Belesant. After he has accompanied Charlemagne on his expedition
to Spain and contributed his share to the victory of the Christians, he marries
Belesant and becomes lord of Lombardy. The oldest version in English is the
Otuel in four-stress couplets preserved in the Auchinleck MS.10 It is without
much merit. Somewhat better is the Duke Rowland and Sir Otuell of Spay 11
preserved in the same manuscript as the Sege of Melayne. It has more minstrel
vigor. Like the Sege of Melayne it is in tail-rime stanzas and was composed in
the north. The third romance, the Fillingham Otuel and Roland,12 is probably
a continuation of Roland and Vernagu and differs from the other Otuel
romances in carrying on the story for another thousand lines with material
drawn from Pseudo-Turpin. 13 In brief form the addition recounts
Charlemagnes victories over the Saracen Ebrahim and the King of Navarre
and concludes with Rolands death at Roncevaux. All three Otuel romances
have a number of peculiar features in common and even individual lines or
short passages. Although they diverge widely enough to preclude the possibility
of mutual dependence, they are probably all based ultimately upon an English
romance now lost.
The interest in the Charlemagne romance in England seems to have been
mainly pietisticthe glorification of the Christian faith. The Fillingham
Otuel opens with a demand for attention in the worchype of ihesu cryst,
and the Ferumbras in the same manuscript ends with a promise of one
hundred days pardon to all who listen to the story with gode devocyoun.
The Sowdone of Babylone begins with a homiletic opening, and the rough
draft of Sir Ferumbras was begun on the back of two ecclesiastical
documents. Both Ferumbras and Otuel, the two chief Saracen champions,
are converted, and there are many cases of divine intervention. In the Sege
of Melayne the militant bishop Turpin, although somewhat melodramatic
and blustering, is a truly heroic figure and certainly the main character. The
subject of the Sultan of Babylon-Ferumbras romances is the loss and recovery
of the Crown of Thorns and other sacred relics, supposedly given by
Charlemagne to the church of St. Denis. Indeed these romances constitute a
kind of Carlovingian counterpart of the Grail theme in Arthurian romance,
with Roland and Oliver answering to Perceval and Gawain in Chrtien.
Judged by both choice of subject and treatment the English Charlemagne
10
EETSES, 39.
EETSES, 35.
12
Ed. Mary I.OSullivan, Firumbras and Otuel and Roland (as above, note 7). The Roland and
Vernagu and the Otuel and Roland are often given the group title Charlemagne and Roland. See die
important studies of Ronald N.Walpole, Charlemagne and Roland: A Study of the Sources of Two
Middle English Romances, Roland and Vernagu and Otuel and Rolnad (Berkeley and Los Angeles,
1944; Univ. of Calif. Pub. in Mod. Phil., Vol. XXI, No. 6, pp. 385452), and H.M.Smyser, Charlemagne
and Roland and the Auchinleck MS, Speculum, XXI (1946). 275288.
13
A spurious Historia Caroli Magni et Rotholandi, written in the twelfth century and fathered on
Archbishop Turpin. The latest edition is that of H.M.Smyser, The Pseudo-Turpin (Cambridge, Mass.,
1937).
11
THE ROMANCE: II
189
romances seem, with one or two exceptions, to be a group in which the

missionary spirit is made to work through minstrel recitation.
iv. The Matter of Britain

The development of the Arthurian legend up to its first appearance in English
in Layamons Brut, while encumbered with numerous vexed questions, is not
without a recognizable continuity.14 Now, so far as England is concerned,
that continuity is broken, for English romances on Arthurian subjects do not
begin to appear until about 1300 and in spite of the interval of but a century
that divided them from Layamon, they seem to be separated, generally
speaking, by a much wider gulf. The reason is not far to seek. Arthurian
romance enjoyed its great creative period in the latter part of late and the
twelfth century and the beginning of the thirteenth, particularly in France
and Germany. It was the period of Chrtien de Troyes, Wolfram von
Eschenbach, Gottfried von Strassburg, and others only less great. As the
thirteenth century wore on, the impulse lost some of its force. The English
Arthurian romances follow later and, since their sources are nearly all French,
reflect this earlier development. But to read them without knowing their French
background is like seeing a play in which we have missed the second act.15 It
might seem reasonable to expect that the English romances, built on so solid
a French foundation, would reach an equally high level. Unfortunately, the
great days of medieval romance were past, and English poets, with a few
notable exceptions, were unable to recapture the spontaneity and fire of their
Continental predecessors.
It is one of the distinctions of Chrtien that he got away from the
biographical or compendious type of romance found, for example, in the
Roman dAlexandre or Bevis of Hampton and confined himself to a single
episode or closely related group of episodes in his heros career. Later Arthurian
romance generally follows this pattern.16 There are accordingly almost no
English romances which attempt to cover the whole life of Arthur. There is a
short poem of 642 lines, probably written in the second half of the fourteenth
century, to which the name Arthur 17 has been given. It is of slight value and
would scarcely deserve mention if it were not the only example of this inclusive
type. Elsewhere we have only romances on certain aspects of Arthurs career,
or on the adventures of individual knights of the Round Table, or on themes
such as the history of the Holy Grail.
14
See ch. VIII. It should be remembered that Layamons Brut is a translation of Wace and therefore
represents the state of Arthurian development prior to Chrtien.
15
For the linguistic conditions that account for the lateness of English romance see above, p. III.
16
In thirteenth-century France the separate stories were again combined into long composites, this
time intended for reading rather than recitation. These were in prose. The best known is the Vulgate
Cycle generally attributed in the manuscripts, though quite falsely, to Walter Map. Malorys Morte
Darthur is an example of such a composite in English.
17
EETS, 2. It is incorporated in a Latin chronicle of the kings of Britain. It traces briefly Arthurs
life from birth to death. From the circumstance that the narrator pauses every hundred lines and bids
the listener to say a paternoster one must assume a clerical origin.
English
Arthurian
Romances
Late and
Derivative
Romances
of Arthur
190
and Merlin
Gawain
Lancelot
The early life of Arthur is intimately associated with the figure of Merlin.
It was through Merlins magic that Uther Pendragon gained access to Ygerne
the night Arthur was begotten. His advice and supernatural powers are helpful
to Arthur on many occasions from the time the young prince pulls the sword
from the stone and becomes king until he has emerged successfully from his
contests with the rebels at home and his enemies abroad. This phase of
Arthurian story is told in a romance of nearly ten thousand lines, called Arthur
and Merlin, written about 1300.18 It is not an inspired production; indeed it
becomes rather tedious with its endless detail of battles and combats and its
particularity concerning the numbers in each army and division and petty
band. It is evidently based on a French sourcevariously referred to as the
Brut, the romance, or simply the bookapparently in verse and similar
in content to the French prose Merlins.
Gawains early adventures, largely military, constitute a major element in
the romance just spoken of. His various exploits were destined to become the
most popular of the subjects from which English poets chose their themes. A
dozen romances, many of them short and rather late, attest his continued
popularity. The greatest, of course, is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight,
more fully discussed among the works of the Pearl poet.19 Admirably smooth
in style and narrative technique is Ywain and Gawain 20 (c. 1350), in which
Gawain and the hero fight a drawn battle, each ignorant of the others identity.
It is an adaptation of Chrtiens Ywain slightly condensed. Further evidence
of Gawains preeminence in popular favor is the fact that his son is made the
hero of a romance, Libeaus Desconus (The Fair Unknown).21 In this story
Gingelein, the unknown and untried knight, undertakes to free the Queen of
Sinadoun from captivity and enchantment. He succeeds, after preliminary
encounters with sundry knights and giants, and in the end weds the lady.22
Lancelot is the subject of only one English romance, the late-fifteenthcentury Lancelot of the Laik.23 It tells of his part in the war between Arthur
18
Eugen Klbing, Arthour and Merlin, nach der Auchinleck-HS, nebst zwei Beilagen (Leipzig,
1890; Altenglische Bibliothek, IV).
19
See below, pp. 236.
20
Ed. Gustav Schleich, Ywain and Gawain (Oppeln, 1887).
21
Ed. Max Kaluza (Leipzig, 1890; Altenglische Bibliothek, v). The source is a French romance
closely resembling Le Bel Inconnu (ed. G.P.Williams, Paris, 1929; CFMA, 38). See further Wm. Schofield,
Studies on the Libeaus Desconus (Boston, 1895); Harvard Studies & Notes in Phil. & Lit., IV.).
22
Most of the Gawain romances can be found in Sir Frederic Madden, Syr Gawayne (London,
1839; Bannutyne Club, LXI). For other editions see Wells and the CHEL. These include The Green
Knight, a fifteenth-century retelling of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight; The Turk and Gawain, in
which a more primitive form of the same story can be recognized; Sir Gawain and the Carl of Carlisle
which treats the temptation part of the story in a variant form. The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame
Ragnellthere is a modernization by George Brandon Saul (1934)is a version of the story, so
beautifully told by the Wife of Bath, of the knight and the loathly lady. In the Geste of Sir Gawain the
hero, surprised in his love-making, is forced to fight the ladys father and brothers. His reputation for
valor and fine courtesy is maintained in Golagrus and Gawain, involving an expedition to the Holy
Land; his generosity is featured in The Awntyrs (Adventures) of Arthur, where an adventure of Gawain
is loosely combined with a religious theme better known in The Trental of St. Gregory.
23
There are several editions, the most useful being that of W.W.Skeat (1865; EETS, 6).
THE ROMANCE: II
191
and Galiot (Galehault). following the French prose Lancelot, and doubtless
ended with Guineveres acceptance of him as her lover, although this part of
the text is missing. In spite of some vigorous battle scenes, in which both
Gawain and Lancelot distinguish themselves, it is a bookish production with
a tedious prologue which is not fully redeemed by some interesting Chaucerian
echoes, and the story pauses in the middle while Arthur receives with more
patience than the reader a seven-hundred-line sermon on the duties of
kingship.24 The author was a Scot who affected certain dialectal traits of
Southern English. While this is our sole Lancelot romance so far as title goes,
the stanzaic Morte Arthur 25 (c. 1400) is really concerned chiefly with
Lancelots adventures, his love for the queen, their final parting, and his death.
It takes its name from the latter half when the lovers are betrayed by Agravain
and Arthur makes war on Lancelot. It is in the midst of this struggle that
Arthur is forced by Mordreds treason to return home and later receives his
death wound. The narrative is terse and the action rapid. The Morte Arthur
is the most ballad-like of the longer English romances. It is to be sharply
distinguished from the romance of similar title, the alliterative Morte Arthure
(c. 1360).26 The latter is the story of Arthurs Roman campaign, which in this
romance is interrupted by Mordreds treason. Unlike the stanzaic tale, the
alliterative Morte Arthure makes no mention of Arthurs being carried off by
boat to be healed of his wounds. He here dies a mortals death and is buried
at Glastonbury. The romance is found in a MS copied by Robert Thorn ton c.
143040, but recent discoveries make it clear that in Thorntons text the
original has been altered and shortened.27 That original was undoubtedly
Malorys source for the episode in the Morte Darthur (Book v), paraphrased
and severely condensed. The alliterative Morte Arthure is remarkable for its
careful workmanship and artistic elaboration. On various occasions the author
lets his pen flowthe farewell scene between Arthur and Guinevere, Arthurs
banquet, his fight with the giant, his dream, his final battleand the result is
a fullness of treatment and richness of detail rare in the romances of England.
The narrative is that of a vigorous and genuinely gifted poet.
Two of the most popular subjects of the Arthurian cycle in the Middle
Ages, the Perceval-Grail theme and the Tristan story, receive but little
24
On the basis of this passage a date after 1482 has been suggested. See Bertram Vogel, Secular
Politics and the Date of Lancelot of the Laik. SP, XL (1943). 113.
25
The most accessible editions are those of J.Douglas Bruce (1903; EETSES, 88) and Samuel
B.Hemingway (Boston, 1912). On the interesting question of the relation of this poem to Books xx and
XXI of Malory, see Bruce, The Middle English Metrical Romance Le Morte Arthur (Harleian MS 2252):
Its Sources and the Relation to Sir Thomas Malorys Morte Darthur, Anglia, XXIII (1900). 67100.
26
The best editions are those of E.Brock (1871, EETS, 8), Mary M.Banks (1900), and Erik Bjrkman
(Heidelberg, 1915). S.O.Andrew, The Dialect of Morte Arthure, RES, IV (1928). 418423, argues
convincingly that the original dialect was Northwest Midland. On the sources see R.H.Griffith, Malory,
Morte Arthure, and Fierabras, Anglia, XXXII (1909). 389398, and Tania Vorontzoff, Malorys
Story of Arthurs Roman Campaign, MA, VI ( 1937). 99121. The latter is a corrective to P.Branschcid,
ber die Quellen des stabreimenden Morte Arthure, Anglia Anzeiger, VIII (1885). 179236,
meritorious for its day and still useful.
27
E.V.Gordon and E.Vinaver, New Light on the Text of the Alliterative Morte Arthure, MA, VI
(1937). 8198.
Morte
Arthur
Perceval
192
The Holy
Grail
Tristan
attention from English poets. Sir Perceval of Gales (Wales),28 in sixteen-line

stanzas linked by conscious repetition, tells a part of the story found in
Chrtiens Perceval. Perceval, reared in the forest in ignorance of knighthood,
is here even more the rustic than usual, but shows his ability by killing the
Red Knight and other opponents, rescues the Lady Lufamour from her Saracen
suitor, and marries her. In the end he is happily reunited with his mother.
There is no Grail quest; the Grail is not even mentioned. The English romance
preserves the Perceval story in a distinctly primitive form, and although the
question has been much discussed, it is doubtful if the poem owes anything
to Chrtiens romance or its continuations.29 The quest of the Holy Grail is
not treated in any Middle English romance outside of Malory. But quite early
an attempt was made to account for the Grail and its mystical history. This
appears in Robert de Borons Joseph dArimathie (see p. 141) and in greatly
expanded form in the Vulgate Estoire del Saint Graal.30 A brief English
romance in 709 alliterative lines, Joseph of Arimathie31 (c. 1350), tells the
early part of the story, and a century later a London skinner, Henry Lovelich,
told it at great length in a poem which goes by the name of The History of
the Holy Grail.32 The story of Tristan and Iseult comes off still worse at the
hands of English poets. The only separate treatment of the theme (i.e., outside
of Malory) is a northern poem of about 1300 called Sir Tristrem.33 It is written
in a curious eleven-line stanza in which most lines have three stresses. The
effect of the verse is quite staccato and the narrative is equally so. Although
the poet contrives to tell the story in most of its incidentsfrom the birth of
the hero, his adventures at the court of King Mark and in Ireland, his mission
to conduct Iseult to be the bride of his uncle, the drinking of the fateful love
potion, the many adventures which his clandestine meetings with Iseult lead
to, down to the final episode in which he diesthe narrative is generally so
abrupt and condensed that without previous knowledge of the story it would
in some places hardly be understood and in others would seem poorly
motivated. It is seemingly the work of a minstrel telling a tale already familiar
to his audience.
28
J.Campion and F.Holthausen, Sir Perceval of Gales (Heidelberg, 1913; Alt-und Mittelenglische
Texte, No. 5). There is an earlier edition by J.O.Halliwell (1844; Camden Soc..). The poem was written
in the north Midlands about 1350.
29
The literature is too extensive to be listed here. The student may consult Reginald H. Griffith, Sir
Perceval of Galles: A Study of the Sources of the Legend (Chicago, 1911) and a series of articles by
Arthur C.L.Brown called The Grail and the English Sir Perceval in MP, XVIXXII (191924); opposed
by Bruce (I. 309312) and others.
30
For a discussion of this part of the Vulgate cycle, see Bruce, I. 374394.
31
W.W.Skeat, Joseph of Arimathie (1871; EETS, 44).
32
See p. 300.
33
Edited by E.Klbing, Die nordische u. die englische Version der Tristansage (2V, Heilbronn,
187882) and by George P.McNeill, Sir Tristrem (Edinburgh, 1886; Scottish Text Soc., VIII). Bertram
Vogel, The Dialect of Sir Tristrem, JEGP, XL (1941). 538544, shows that the dialect of the
Auchinleck text is prevailingly that of London or the southeast Midlands and not Northern, and suggests
that the author was a Londoner who had spent part of his youth in the north. It seems simplest,
however, to believe that the numerous instances of a for Old English a and occasionally other Northern
features are inherited from a Northern original.
THE ROMANCE: II
193
English romance contrives to treat most of the major figures and famous
themes of Arthurian legendMerlin and the early life of Arthur, Lancelot,
Gawain, the morte dArthur, Perceval, the Grail history, Tristan and Iseult.
Only the Grail quest is lacking. Nevertheless what remains seems like the
chance survival of a few romances, and not always the best, from a much
larger number that either died on the lips of the minstrels who chanted them
or have perished in the precarious course of manuscript transmission.
v. Non-cycle Romances
There were many romances outside the three matters noted by Jean Bodel
and the group which we have called the Matter of England. Among them is
one of the earliest to be written in English, Floris and Blauncheflour,34 probably
dating from somewhat before 1250. It is an Eastern story with analogues in
the Arabian Nights. It concerns a kings son who refuses to give up the girl he
loves, even after she has been sold to merchants and carried overseas, who
finds her in Babylon among the maidens of the Sultan, and eventually is
united to her. Although somewhat too brief and condensed in style, it is a
charming little love story. Ipomedon 35 is an artfully contrived variation of
the Guy of Warwick themethe hero must establish his reputation for prowess
before winning his ladys hand. In The Squire of Low Degree 36 a simple
squire is in love with the King of Hungarys daughter. The lady in this case is
favorable to him. She is also faithful to the point of keeping what she supposes
is his dead body in her room for seven years. When he reappears alive and
suitable explanations have been made the lovers are married with the full
approval of the King. Eger and Grime,37 in which the lady will wed only a
knight who has never been conquered, won the commendation of even so
unpartisan a critic as Lowell. A somewhat different theme appears in Amis
and Amiloun,38 the devoted friendship of two men, which does not stop for
leprosy or the slaying of the ones children when the others life is at stake.
A group of romances, often in the twelve-line tail-rime stanza popular in
the north,39 concerns the patiently suffering wife, plotted against, exiled,
deprived of her children, but eventually restored to happiness. Such is the
matter of Sir Eglamour 40 and Torrent of Portingale, which closely resemble
each other. In Sir Isumbras, the husband suffers as well. Sometimes, as in
Octavian, a wicked mother-in-law brings about the wifes persecution, sometimes
34
Most recent edition by A.B.Taylor (Oxford, 1927). The reader will be reminded of the charming
French chante-fable, Aucassin et Nicolete, of the thirteenth century.
35
E.Klbing, Ipomedon, in drei englischen Bearbeitungen (Breslau, 1889).
36
Ed. W.E.Mead (Boston, 1904).
37
Ed. J.R.Caldwell (Cambridge, Mass., 1933; Harvard Studies in Compar. Lit., IX).
38
Ed. MacEdward Leach (1937; EETS, 203).
39
A score of romances in this stanza form indicate its vogue at one time. An attempt has been made
by A.M.Trounce, The English Tail-Rhyme Romances, MA, I (1932). 87108, 168182; II (1933).
3457, 189198; III (1934). 3050, to show that these romances have their source in East Anglia, but
the conclusion cannot be accepted.
40
For editions of the romances mentioned in this section see Wells Manual and Laura A. Hibbard,
The Medival Romance in England.
Floris and
Blauncheflour
Ipomedon
The
Squire of
Low
Degree
Sir
Eglamour
194
William of
Palerne
Minor
Romances
Romances
of Didactic
Intent
a treacherous steward, as in Sir Triamour. In Le Bon Florence of Rome

treachery is manifold and knows no bounds.
The supernatural enters incidentally into many romances, but in certain
stories it is fundamental. William of Palerne tells the story of a prince of
Spain who has been turned into a werewolf by his stepmother. The werewolf
carries off William, the King of Apulias son, who, when found and brought
up by the Emperor, falls in love with the Emperors daughter. After many
adventures Williams identity is revealed, the wicked stepmother is forced to
return the werewolf to his rightful form, and the story ends in marriages all
around.41 The twelve-thousand line Partonope of Blois 42 is a fairy-mistress
story in which Partonopes love for the mysterious Melior is twice interrupted
when he disobeys her instructions and breaks the spell, but in which of course
he eventually marries her. In the romance of Partenay 43 (or Melusine) the
hero is not so fortunate. He marries a fairy of great beauty, promising not to
disturb her on Saturdays, and is supremely happy until one Saturday he spies
on her and finds that on this day she is a serpent from the waist down. He is
forgiven the first time but when he repeats his offense he loses her forever.
The brief alliterative romance, the Chevelere Assigne,44 less than four hundred
lines long, is the only treatment of the swan-knight story in English verse.
A few minor romances are interesting for special reasons. The Tale of
Gamelin is found in a number of manuscripts of the Canterbury Tales,
generally assigned to the Cook, and was probably among Chaucers papers
waiting to be worked up for one of the pilgrims. It is the story of the illtreated younger brother which was to find its way into As You Life It. Sir
Degrevant concerns a vassal wronged by his overlord, who marries the
daughter and not only recovers his own but inherits his overlords lands. It
suggests the usurer plot in Elizabethan drama. Generides, of which we have
a version in couplets and a second in rime royal, is an interesting compound
of stock featureswicked steward, exiled king, faithless wife, lovers separated
and estranged. In the end Clarionas comes like Iseult to cure Generides and
the lovers are married.45
Certain romances, finally, seem to have been composed with a clearly
didactic intent. Sir Amadas exemplifies courtesy, generosity, pledges kept
at great sacrifice, and the like. Sir Amadas has exhausted his estate in
entertainment and liberality, even giving his last forty pounds to pay off the
debts of a dead knight and permit the burial of the body. When he later
marries a princess and regains his former prosperity it is through the help
of the soul of the grateful dead. Sir Cleges turns on a. familiar folk motif.
41
For an interesting discussion of the storys reflection of actual people see Irene P. McKeehan,
Guillaume de Palerne: A Medieval Best Seller, PMLA, XLI (1926). 785809.
42
Ed. A.T.Bdtker (1912; EETSES, 109).
43
Ed. W.W.Skeat (1866; EETS, 22).
44
Ed. Henry H.Gibbs (1868; EETSES, 6).
45
Sometimes classed with the romance is The Seven Sages of Rome, known in the East as the Book
of Sindibad. It is a collection of framed tales and exists in three different Middle English versions. Ed.
Killis Campbell (Boston, 1907); Karl Brunner (1933; EETS, 191).
THE ROMANCE: II
195
The hero, forced to share any reward he receives with grasping officials, asks
for twelve strokes.46 A didactic purpose is obvious in The King of Tars. A
Christian princess married to a heathen sultan gives birth to a formless lump
of flesh. After the heathen gods have proved powerless, baptism changes the
monstrosity to a handsome boy.47 In Titus and Vespasian 48 (c. 1400) we have
a thoroughly religious romance with its stories of the life of Christ, Pilate,
Judas, and others woven into the miraculous cure of Vespasian from leprosy
through the agency of St. Veronicas handkerchief and his own belief in Christ.
The shorter and perhaps slightly earlier Siege of Jerusalem,49 in alliterative
verse, is similar in matter, but the poets main interest is in the description of
the battle. In stories such as these two it is difficult to say where romance
ends and religious legend begins.50
vi. The Breton Lay and the Fabliau

Most medieval romances were too long to be recited at one sitting and some
of them are furnished with convenient stopping points at intervals in the
story. It is obvious, however, that short narratives suitable for a brief recitation,
capable like the modern short story of being read or heard in complete form
at one time, would be composed. Certain romances just considered, such as
Sir Cleges and Sir Eglamour, are of suitable length for a single recitation and
do not differ in subject matter and treatment from some of the stories discussed
in the present section. They could well be included here. But it has become
customary to segregate a small number of such short pieces and give them,
with not too much warrant, the distinctive name of Breton lays.
It would seem that at one time the Bretons had a reputation for storytelling, a reputation which may owe much of its currency in the later Middle
Ages to Marie de France. It is conceivable that their shorter tales were
distinguished by a particular musical form, that they showed a predilection
for love and the supernatural in subject matter, and that many of them had
their setting in Brittany. But by the time such tales were written in English,
that is, in the fourteenth century, references to the lays of the Bretons seem to
be a mere convention. They are always spoken of as belonging to the rather
distant past. Thus, when Chaucers Franklin begins to tell one of them he
says:
46
See John R.Reinhard, Strokes Shared, Jour. Amer. Folk-Lore, XXXVI (1923). 380400.
See Lillian H.Hornstein, A Folklore Theme in The King of Tars, PQ, XX (1941). 8287; The
Historical Background of The King of Tars, Speculum, XVI (1941). 404414; New Analogues to
the King of Tars, MLR, XXXVI (1941). 433442. The valuable discussion of Robert J.Geist, On the
Genesis of The King of Tars, JEGP, XLII (1943). 260268, should also be consulted.
48
Ed. J.A.Herbert (1905; Roxburghe Club).
49
Ed. G.Steffler (Emden, 1891), and E.Klbing and Mabel Day (1932; EETS, 188).
50
On the relation between saints legend and romance see Irene P.McKeehan, Some Relationships
between the Legends of British Saints and Medieval Romance, [Univ. of Chicago] Abstracts of Theses,
Humanistic Ser., II (1926). 383391, and the portion printed in full as St. Edmund of East Anglia:
The Development of a Romantic Legend, Univ. of Colorado Studies, XV (1925). 1374.
47
The
Breton
Lay
196
Thise olde gentil Britouns in hir dayes

Of diverse adventures maden layes,
Rymeyed in hir firste Briton tonge;
Whiche layes with hir instrumentz they songe,
Or elles redden hem for hir plesaunce.
This is similar to the opening lines of Sir Orfeo, a passage which is also found
at the beginning of the Lay le Freine, where we are told:
In Brytayn is layes arne y-wryte,
Furst y-founde and fore y-gete.
Emare
Sir
Degare
When ey myght owher [anywhere] heryn

Of adventurs at er weryn,
Pey toke her harpys wi game,
Maden layes and Zaf it name.
The same passage tells us that Breton lays may treat of almost any subject
weal or woe, joy and mirth, treachery and guile, even jests and ribaldry;
some, it says, are of fary, but most are about love. Certainly there is nothing
distinctive in the subject or treatment of the so-called Breton lays in English,
and whether a given short romance is classed as a Breton lay or not depends
mainly on whether it says it is one (e.g., The Earl of Toulouse, Sir Orfeo, Lay
le Freine), or has its scene laid in Brittany (Sir Degar), or contains a passing
reference to Brittany (Sir Launfal), or tells a story found among the lais of
Marie de France. Doubtless reference to the Bretons was often no more than
a trick of the poet to lend authority or the charm of age to his story.
We can but glance in passing at the delightful little English poems which
constitute the group. Emare 51 is a supreme instance of a story made up of
the commonplaces of romance. There is not a novel character or situation
in it. To list its episodes is to begin a motif-index of medieval romancethe
emperor who wishes to marry his own daughter, the heroine set adrift in a
boat, in this case twice, the wicked mother-in-law who not only opposes
her sons marriage but by a substitution of letters brings about the unhappy
brides exile, pilgrimages to Rome with their chain of coincidences bringing
about final recognition and reunion. It must not be supposed, however,
that the story is without charm. Emare herself is very beautiful, and bears
her sufferings with so much sweetness and patience that she wins our hearts.
The king, her husband, loves her so loyally and behaves so honorably that
we rejoice with him when his wife and child are at long last restored. Emare
is classed as a Breton lay because the poet says it is one. Chaucers Constance
story told by the Man of Law, which is very similar, is not. Sir Degar 52 is
also made up of familiar featuresthe king who will marry his daughter
51
Ed. A.B.Gough (Heidelberg, 1901), Edith Rickert (1908; EETSES, 99), and in French and Hales
Middle English Metrical Romances.
52
Ed. David Laing (1849; Abbotsford Club), and in French and Hale, op. cit. A later text is in
Hales and Furnivalls edition of the Percy Folio, Vol. III. See also George P.Faust, Sir Degare: A Study
of the Texts and Narrative Structure (1935; Princeton Studies in English, II).
THE ROMANCE: II
197
only to one who overcomes him in battle, the daughter forced to yield to an
unknown knight in the forest, the child left on a hermits step, the youth who
nearly marries his own mother but recognizes her through a pair of gloves
that will fit no one else, the son who discovers his father through a sword with
a missing piece. The scene is Little Britain, but this is the only thing that makes
it a Breton lay.
Two of the English lays derive ultimately from lais of Marie de France. The
Lay le Freine,53 so named, as the English poet tells us, because freine in French
means ash-tree, tells the story of an infant abandoned in a hollow ash, who
later wins a husband and her parents back through one turn of Fortunes wheel.
Sir Landeval54 is about a knight who enjoys the love of a fairy mistress as long
as he refrains from any mention of her, who breaks the covenant and loses her,
but, since there are extenuating circumstances, recovers her favor. Sir Landeval
was elaborated by Thomas of Chester in his Sir Launfal,55 without always being
improved in the process. Sir Orfeo56 retells the classical story of Orpheus and
Eurydice with medieval modifications. Sir Gowther,57 telling the legend of
Robert the Devil, is not without its didactic intent; indeed one manuscript ends
with the words, Explicit Vita Sancti. The Earl of Toulouse58 is the story of a
vassal persecuted by the Emperor; in the end he not only wins justice but marries
the Emperors beautiful widow. It resembles in a number of ways the story of
Sir Degrevant (see above), but because the author of The Earl of Toulouse
says he got it from a lay of Bretayn the latter is included among Breton lays.
The edifying element found in some of the lays becomes the chief feature
of another type of short narrative, the miracle of the Virgin. The miracle
of the Virgin is a kind of conte dvot or pious tale in which devotion to the
Virgin wins her intercession. Thus, the nun who has run away from her
convent and has returned repentant after a period of worldly life finds her
absence unnoticed. Because she had venerated the Virgin from the days
when she was a young novice, her place has been supplied and her duties
have been performed by the Mother of Christ. Readers are familiar with
the story in John Davidsons Ballad of a Nun and in the dramatic production
The Miracle, in which Lady Diana Manners appeared in the rle of the
Virgin. In another widely distributed example a harlot is induced to pray.
She prays in a chapel dedicated to the Virgin and at her death is assured of
salvation. The tale told by Chaucers Prioress is another well-known example
of the type. A small collection of these stories is found in the South English
Legendary. A more important group of forty-two apparently once formed
part of the famous Vernon manuscript, but in the present mutilated
condition of the codex only nine are preserved. Finally, not to mention
53
Ed. H.Weber, Metrical Romances, Vol. I, and H.Varnhagen, Anglia, in (1880), 415423.
Ed. G.L.Kittredge, Amer. Jour. Phil., X (1889). 133, and Rudolf Zimmermann (Kningsberg,
1900).
55
Most conveniently available in French and Hale, op. cit.
56
In French and Hale, op. cit.
57
Ed. Karl Breul (Oppeln, 1886).
58
In French and Hale, op. cit.
54
Le Freine
Sir
Landeval
Other
Lays
Miracles
of the
Virgin
198
The
Fabliau
Examples
in Chaucer
scattered examples, there is a collection of eighteen in a Phillipps manuscript

now in the British Museum. These collections, which are all in verse, extend
from the thirteenth to the fifteenth century, but the type is dateless and
examples in English may well have existed as early as the twelfth century.59
One other form of narrative poem in Middle English must be mentioned
here, and its aim was simply to entertain. The fabliau, like the lay and the
miracle of the Virgin, is short, but there the resemblance stops. It is a humorous
story, generally ribald or at least unconventional, told in verse with conscious
literary art. In the Middle Ages it enjoyed its greatest vogue in France,60 but
turned into prose it forms an important element in such collections of tales as
we have in Boccaccios Decameron and their derivatives in all the languages
of Europe. It is in no sense biographical and seeks its effect in the rapid
succession of events forming a single episode. Its humor is not that of the jest,
nor does it depend on a play on words, but is the humor of situation, rooted
in human nature. It has a special fondness for wives who trick their husbands,
and individuals whose greed or gullibility makes them fair game for the
cleverness of rogues.
In English the type is best represented by a half dozen stories in Chaucers
Canterbury Tales, those told by the Miller, the Reeve, the Friar, the Summoner,
the Merchant, and the Shipman. The Cooks tale would undoubtedly have
been of the type if he had gone on. That Chaucer was aware of the effect
which such of his tales would have upon some readers is evident in his warning
just before beginning the Millers Tale:
And therefore, whoso list it nat yheere,
Turne over the leef and ches another tale.
Dame
Sirith
Before Chaucer the only true fabliau in English is Dame Sirith 61 (c. 1250),
turning on a trick by which Dame Sirith, a hypocritical bawd, succeeds in
terrifying a young wife named Margeri into accepting as a lover the clerk
Wilekin. The plot outrages probability, but the tale is skilfully told with
much natural dialogue. There are a few post-Chaucerian pieces such as The
59
The basic work on the miracles of the Virgin is A.Mussafia, Studien zu den miittelalterlichen
Marienlegenden (5 parts, Vienna, 188798; Sitzungsbcrichte der kgl. Akad. der Wissenchaften, Philos.hist. Classe, CXIIICXXXIX). Much important material on collections in Latin, French, and English
will be found in H.L.D.Ward, Catalogue of Romancesin the British Museum, II (1893). 586740. A
list of Latin miracles running to nearly 1800 items has been published by Father Poncelet in Analecta
Bollandiana, XXI (1902). 241360. One of the best known collections in the Middle Ages was that of
Johannes Herolt, which can be read in the translation of C.C.S.Bland (1928), with an excellent short
Introduction by Eilcen Power. G.G.Coulton, Five Centuries of Religion, I (Cambridge, 1923). 501
516, offers a brief discussion with examples. Ruth W.Tryon, Miracles of Our Lady in Middle English
Verse, PMLA, XXXVIII (1923). 308388, publishes a number of hitherto unprinted texts.
60
The standard work on the subject is J.Bdier, Les Fabliaux (4ed., Paris, 1925). For the fabliau in
English see the introduction to George H.McKnight, Middle English Humorous Tales in Verse (Boston,
1913), H.S.Canby, The English Fabliau, PMLA, XXI (1906). 200214, and W.M.Hart, The Fabliau
and Popular Literature, PMLA, XXIII (1908). 329374.
61
In McKnight, as above, and for discussion see Edward Schrder, Dame Sirith, Nachrichten
aus der neueren Philologie und Literaturgeschichte, I (1937). 179202 (Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften
zu Gttingen).
THE ROMANCE: II
199
Wrights Chaste Wife62 and The Prioress and Her Three Suitors,63 but they
do not merit treatment here. When we consider that nearly one hundred and
fifty specimens of the fabliau are found in Old French, we can only believe
that these realistic episodes from everyday life ran counter to the more
puritan spirit in England and were less often committed to writing than
allowed to die on the lips of minstrels and other purveyors of backstairs
entertainmant.64
62
Edited by Furnivall, EETS, 12.

Ed. Johannes Prinz, A Tale of a Prioress and Her Three Wooers (Berlin, 1911; Literarhistorische
Forschungen, 47), and J.O.Halliwell, Minor Poems ofLydgate (1840; Percy Soc., II), pp. 107117.
64
A number of stories found in the French fabliaux occur in the English ballads.
63
XI
The Omnibus of Religion
Ignorance
among the
Lower
Clergy
The
Coming
of the
Friars
Their
Emphasis
on
Preaching
In 1222 the Bishop of Salisbury ordered an examination of the priests in seventeen

of his parishes. The examination was a simple one, based on the words, Te igitur
clementissime Paterrogamus (we therefore beseech thee, most merciful
Father). These words open the first prayer in the Canon of the Mass, the most
solemn and at the same time an invariable part of the service. Five could not tell
the case of te or identify the governing verb. Some of the others refused to answer.
The incident is unfortunately not an isolated case. The ignorance of parish priests
was frequently appalling, especially in country parishes remote from towns and
larger centers. In the register of William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester, it
is more than once recorded that a priest was made to take oath that within one
year he would learn the Creed, the Ten Commandments, the Seven Deadly Sins,
etc. under penalty of being fined forty shillings. In the light of such cases we
need not be surprised at frequent complaints that the simplest spiritual needs of
the people were not being cared for.1
When an evil is clearly recognized the remedy is often not far off. At the
beginning of the thirteenth century St. Francis and St. Dominic conceived almost
at the same time the idea of carrying religion directly to the people, without
the organization of churches and religious houses. St. Francis was filled with
the need for embracing poverty and ministering to the poor, St. Dominic with
the necessity of combating heresy. With incredible rapidity they gained followers
and soon the Friars Minor and the Friars Preachers had spread over many parts
of Europe. The Dominicans reached England in 1221 and the Franciscans in
1224. Though learning was in the beginning more necessary to the Preachers
than to the Minorites, both orders soon found it necessary to the successful
prosecution of their work. The friars were in time to become famous for learning
and for works in which that learning was adapted to the spiritual needs of the
people.
While the activities of the friars were greatest among the depressed classes
in the poorer quarters and on the edges of large cities, there were few
localities that did not come under their influence. So great was the stress
which they laid upon preaching that they even curtailed the rest of the service
to save more time for the sermon. It was their method of bringing home
the teachings of Christ and enforcing his precepts with the vividness of
direct speech. Some friars traveled from place to place, preaching in parish
1
For a brief statement of the facts see G.G.Coulton, Medieval Panorama (1938), pp. 156160, or
Margaret Deanesly, The Lollard Bible (1920), pp. 193195.
200
THE OMNIBUS OF RELIGION
201
churches, the churchyard, the market-place, and the crossroads; others preached
regularly in their own churcheswhich in the course of time they established
on Sundays and festivals and on rainy days, when, as Pecock tells us, great
numbers were wont to come to the friars churches.2 One reason for their
popularity was their concern with basic social and moral questions. Another
was undoubtedly the skill with which they adapted themselves to their audience,
generously sprinkling their discourse with anecdote and illustration and even
adopting devices learned from the minstrels. There is little doubt that they
sometimes preached in verse. Wyclif accuses them of corrupting the word of
God, some by riming and others by preaching poems and fables. 3
The success of the friars was naturally a shock to the regular clergy,
arousing bitterness in some but warm admiration in others. It is not necessary
to suppose that nothing would ever have been done for the people without
the stimulus of the mendicants,4 but the action soon to be taken may well
have owed something to the example of the friars. Robert Grosseteste,
lecturer to the Franciscans at Oxford and one who, though not belonging
to the order himself, expressed the desire to have about him at all times
members of the order, issued a set of Constitutions shortly after he became
Bishop of Lincoln, requiring the clergy in his diocese to know and to teach
the people in their mother tongue the Decalogue, the Seven Deadly Sins,
the Seven Sacraments, and the Creed. A few years later his example was
followed by the Bishop of Worcester,5 while in 1246 the Bishop of Chichester
set up a similar though simpler requirement that the laity be taught the
Paternoster, Creed, and Ave. These efforts toward reform were inspired by
the activities of Innocent III and the decrees of the fourth Lateran Council
(121516), soon reaffirmed by the Council of Oxford called by Stephen
Langton in 1222. But the injunctions of individual bishops were of direct
force only in their own dioceses. In 1281 a regulation of national scope was
2
See A.G.Little, Popular Preaching, in Studies in English Franciscan History (Manchester, 1917),
and the two books of G.R.Owst, Preaching in Medieval England (Cambridge, 1926) and Literature
and Pulpit in Medieval England (Cambridge, 1933). On the friars sermons see Horace G.Pfander, The
Popular Sermon of the Medieval Friar in England (1937).
3
See the references gathered by Deanesly, Lollard Bible, p. 148n.
4
Edmund Rich, Archbishop of Canterbury (123440) in the Merure de Seinte Eglise (Speculum
Ecclesiae), written toward the end of his life, discusses the Seven Deadly Sins, Seven Virtues, Seven
Gifts of the Holy Ghost, Ten Commandments, Twelve Articles of the Faith, Seven Sacraments, Seven
Works of Mercy, and the Seven Petitions of the Pater Noster. This is the standard list of subjects for
popular instruction, but there is no indication that it was intended for the people. The Latin text can
be had only in early editions. The French text has been edited by Harry W.Robbins (Lewisburg, Pa.,
1925). A Middle English translation is printed in C.Horstman, Yorkshire Writers, I (1895), and a
modernized version has been published by Francesca M.Steele (1905).
5
C.R.Cheney, English Synodalia of the Thirteenth Century (Oxford, 1941), proposes a date for
Grossetestes statutes after the synod held at Worcester, but the evidence is not convincing. Grossetestes
Templum Domini, a treatise on the Virtues and Vices, Articles of the Faith, Ten Commandments, and
Sacraments, exists in more than sixty manuscripts but has not been printed. An English poem of the
same name has been published by Roberta D.Cornelius, The Figurative Castle (Bryn Mawr, 1930), pp.
91112. It shows some resemblance to the first half of Grossetestes treatise, but the indebtedness has
been questioned. For Grossetestes Chteau dAmour, which includes brief treatments of the Ten
Commandments, Creed, Seven Sacraments, Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost, etc., see above p. 139.
Their
Influence
202
Archbishop
Peckhams
Constitutions
(1281)
adopted. John Peckham, a Franciscan friar, almost immediately upon becoming

Archbishop of Canterbury called a general council at Lambeth and issued
the famous Constitutions of Lambeth. They begin with a preamble which
asserts that the ignorance of priests casts the people into the pit of error
and then proceeds:
As a remedy for this peril we expressly command that four times a year, that is,
once in each quarter of the year, upon one or more holy days each priest having
charge of the people, either personally or through some one else, shall explain
to the people in their mother tongue, without any fantastic subtlety, the fourteen
articles of the faith, the ten commandments of the decalogue, the two precepts
of the gospels [love of God and love of man], the seven works of mercy, the
seven deadly sins with their offspring, the seven cardinal virtues, and the seven
sacraments of grace. And lest any one on account of ignorance excuse himself
from the aforesaid things, which all ministers of the church are bound to know,
we touch upon them here in a brief summary.
Manuals
and
Treatises in
Latin and
French
A series of paragraphs on the topics mentioned carries out the promise of the last
sentence. Peckhams Constitutions were constantly referred to for upwards of
two hundred years and were followed by a succession of pronouncements from
bishops in various parts of England reaffirming them in spirit and often in identical
words.6 They remained the authoritative outline of doctrine upon which the
people were supposed to be instructed until the end of the Middle Ages.
This basic body of theological teaching was already old long before
Peckhams time, but now that he had provided for its regular presentation
to the people it was soon embodied in a number of works intended for the
common people or for those priests who were in need of simple manuals
or ready-made discourses suitable for oral presentation. Authoritative
sources upon which the authors of such popular treatises could draw were
not lacking. There were especially two great works which became the
parents of a numerous offspring, the huge compilation of Raymond of
Pennafort called the Summa Casuum Poenitentiae (c. 1235) and the twin
treatises of Guillaume de Perrault, the Summa de Vitiis and Summa de
Virtutibus (before 1261). From these and other sources Friar Lorens, the
confessor of Philip the Third, compiled in 1279 a treatise called the Somme
des Vices et Vertus, commonly known as the Somme le Roi, which
circulated widely. An analogous work, and in parts identical, went by the
name of Miroir du Monde. Both the Somme le Roi and the Miroir du Monde
became in turn the parents of numerous works in French and English. The
inter-dependence of the many treatises in which the Ten Commandments,
the Twelve Articles of the Faith (Apostles Creed), the Seven Deadly Sins,
6
See J.L.Peckham, Archbishop Peckham as a Religious Educator (1934; yale Stud, in Religion,
No. 7), pp. 8396. The movement for the reformation of the clergy and for the instruction of the
people in essential doctrine is traced in ch. I of E.J.Arnould, Le Manual des Pchs: tude de littrature
religieuse anglo-normande (XIII e sicle) (Paris, 1940), which appeared during the Second World War
and reached this country too late to be utilized in the writing of this chapter.
203
the Four Cardinal and Three Theological Virtues, the Seven Sacraments, the
Paternoster, the Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost, and often other doctrinal
matters were covered makes it difficult and often impossible to tell where a
given English work owes its chief debt. Chaucers Parsons Tale is an excellent
case in point.
The English works7 range all the way from simple and unpretentious
manuals to highly ingenious and sometimes quite fanciful allegories. The
earlier ones are often in verse. Thus, when John Thoresby, Archbishop of
York, published in 1357 an explanation in Latin of the points prescribed by
Peckham, known in modern times as the Lay Folks Catechism,8 he issued at
the same time a somewhat expanded version in English. The crude verse of
the English was the work of John Gaytryge, a monk of St. Marys abbey,
York; it is commonly known as Dan John Gaytryges Sermon. A little later a
still longer version, likewise in verse, was prepared by John Wyclif or one of
his followers.9 At the beginning of the fifteen century a canon regular of
Lilleshall in Shropshire, John Mirk by name, wrote a manual of Instructions
for Parish Priests.10 He likens many priests to the blind leading the blind,
Wharefore ou preste curatoure
Zef thou be not grete clerk,
Loke thow most on thys werk.
He includes some general instructions on the duties of a parish priest, with
specific directions on the form of baptism, the method of hearing confession,
and the like, but parts of his text were intended to be taught to the people,
and this doubtless was one reason for his writing the whole in verse. For
priests who could manage the Latin a much fuller treatment was provided
in the Speculum Christiani (c. 1360). It is the work of an Englishman and
covers the usual topics. At least sixty-five extant manuscripts testify to its
popularity. It is mentioned here because the whole work was translated
into English by a Lollard, doubtless, as the editor notes, for the benefit of
the many unlearned Lollard preachers and possibly to provide a manual of
devotion for laymen.11 As an example of the elaborate allegorical method
we may cite Jacobs Well, a collection of ninety-five sermons or discourses
delivered to some audience at intervals of a few days (c. 1425). Man is
likened to a well which must be cleansed with the implements used in cleaning
wells, protected against pollution through the springs of the senses, etc. It
7
See on the general subject H.G.Pfandcr, Some Medieval Manuals of Religious Instruction in
England and Observations on Chaucers Parsons Tale, JEGP, XXXV (1936). 243258.
8
An explanation of the Mass and directions for hearing it were provided in English verse about
1300; see The Lay Folks Mass Book. (1879; EETS, 71). In the following century appeared a book for
private devotions known as the Primer; see The Primer or Lay Folks Prayer Book (1895; EETS, 105).
9
All three texts are printed in EETS, 118.
10
Ed. Edward Peacock (1868, rev. ed. 1902; EETS, 31). Most of Mirks treatise is translated from
the second part of William de Pagulas (or Pages) Oculus Sacerdotis, one of a number of Latin texts
called forth by the same need. Space does not permit the discussion of these here.
11
Ed. Gustaf Holmstedt (1933; EETS. 182).
In English
John
Gaytryge
Speculum
Christiani
Jacobs
Well
204
Handlyng
Synne
Ayenbite
of Inwit
Speculum
Vitae
is in prose; the preacher must have been able to count on the attentionand
the enduranceof his audience. Although each discourse fills only about
thirty minutes and for the sake of interest closes with one or two illustrative
stories, it is one of the most voluminous treatises of the kind that we have.12
Virtue and vice in the abstract are likely to be dull subjects. How interesting
a treatise on the Ten Commandments, the Deadly Sins, and the Sacraments
can be when these things are brought realistically into relation with life is
seen in the Handlyng Synne (1303) of Robert of Brunne.13 Based on the AngloNorman Manuel des Pchs of William of Wadington(?),14 with many
omissions and additions, it is in reality a collection of tales and anecdotes
and concrete instances illustrating the vices and weaknesses of man. Holidays
are holy days, not to be spent in dancing, wrestling, crowning a beauty queen,
haunting taverns, or playing chess when one should be in church. Women
should not be proud of their hair, use powder or other flour to make them
whiter of color, or borrow clothes to go to the dance. Miracle plays are
forbidden, but one may play the Resurrection in church. Minstrels get their
clothes, and their meat and drink, through folly. Seldom do we get such a
picture of the details of medieval life. There is not a dull page in the 12,630
lines of the Handlyng Synne.
More simply doctrinal are the translations into English of Friar Lorenss
Somme. The best known of these today is the Ayenbite of Inwit (Remorse
of Conscience) 15 translated in 1340 by Dan Michel of Northgate, who tells
us that the manuscript was written with his own hand and belonged to the
library of St. Augustines, Canterbury. As a specimen of the Kentish dialect it
is important, but it seems to have had no circulation. Other translations of
the Somme were made in the course of the next hundred years, and one of
these, The Book of Vices and Virtues, in the East Midland dialect enjoyed
greater popularity, since it has come down to us in several manuscripts.16
Preserved in more than thirty copies is an adaptation of the Somme in verse
by William of Nassyngton which went by the name of Speculum Vitae. Using
the Paternoster as the point of departure, it presents the whole body of
doctrinal and ethical teaching necessary for laymen in a lively, realistic style
which marks the author as a person of considerable literary gifts.17
12
Only the first half has been published, edited by Arthur Brandeis (1900; EETS, 115). An edition
of the rest is promised by G.R.Owst
13
I.e., manual of sins. Ed. F.J.Furnivall, with the Manuel des Pchs in parallel (19013; EETS,
119, 123). The authors full name was Robert Mannyng, of Brunne or Bourne (Lines.). He belonged to
the Gilbertine priory at Sempringham, but he was for a time at another Gilbertine house at Sixhills and
at Cambridge. His literary activity falls between 1303, when he began the Handlyng Synne, and 1338,
when he finished a translation of Langtofts Chronicle. The latter forms the second part of his Story of
England; the first part is based on Waces Roman de Brut. The two parts are edited respectively in the
Rolls Ser. (1889) and by T. Hearne (2v, Oxford, 1725). The latest examination of the facts of Roberts
life is by Ruth Crosby, Robert Mannyng of Brunne: A New Biography, PMLA, LVII (1942). 1528.
14
See p. 140.
15
Ed. Richard Morris (1866; EETS, 23).
16
Ed. W.Nelson Francis (1942; EETS, 217).
17
An adequate account must await the publication of this important text. Only the first
370 lines have been printed (ESt, VII. 46872). The best discussion is that of Hope Emily
205
Standing somewhat apart from those works which embody in one way or
another Peckhams program is a poem which was intended nevertheless to act
as a spur to righteousness. It is difficult now to see in its 9624 pedestrian lines
how it could ever have become the most popular work of the fourteenth century,
but more than a hundred extant manuscripts show that in this respect the Prick
of Conscience surpassed the Canterbury Tales, Piers Plowman, and every other
Middle English poem. In a prologue and seven parts it tells of the wretched
nature of man, the unstableness of the world, and of death which is inevitable,
thus building up to the last four parts which treat of Purgatory, Doomsday,
the pains of Hell, and the joys of Heaven. It was long attributed to Richard
Rolle, but there is neither external nor internal evidence to justify our continuing
to do so.18
Although none of the manuals for priests recommend including the Sunday
gospel as part of the sermon, the practice was certainly contemplated as early
as Orm, and indeed most medieval books of sermons were made up of homilies
on the Sunday gospel or epistle. With the spread of popular preaching vernacular
collections of such homilies in verse were prepared for delivery either by the
author or by others lacking in cunning or industry. They may have been intended
for private reading as well. One such collection, the Northern Homily Cycle
(c. 1300), provides sermons for the Sundays and certain festivals throughout
the year, many of them furnished with appropriate exempla. The latest student
of this cycle believes it to be the work of a Dominican.19 Prose collections of
similar scope, almost certainly intended to provide ready materials for unlearned
priests, are found in the Festial 20 of John Mirk, whom we have already
mentioned as the author of Instructions for Parish Priests, and in an anonymous
compilation, also of the fifteenth century, known as the Speculum Sacerdotale.21
Allen, Radcliffe Coll. Monographs, No. 15, pp. 169 ff, and her Speculum Vitae: Addendum, PMLA,
XXXII (1917). 133162. We cannot feel sure of the date, the identity of the author, or the immediate
source of the poem. The author says he has translated from the Latin of John de Waldeby, but Miss
Allen has shown that Waldebys treatise on the Paternoster is not the source. In our present state of
knowledge the closest connection seems to be with Friar Lorens and an English prose Myrour to
Lewde Men and Wymmen, similar in content and often verbally identical. The Speculum Vitae is also
one of the sources of Jacobs Well.
18
See Hope Emily Allen, The Authorship of the Prick of Conscience, Radcliffe Coll. Monographs,
No. 15, pp. 115170, and the references under Rolle in ch. XIII. The only edition is that of Richard
Morris for the Philological Society (1863).
19
James E.Carver, The Northern Homily Cycle (1941), abstract of his N.Y.Univ. diss. He believes
it was written between 1295 and 1306, probably before October, 1303. (For his evidence see MLN,
LIII (1938). 258261). Only fragmentary texts have been published by John Small, English Metrical
Homilies from Manuscripts of the Fourteenth Century (Edinburgh, 1862), and C.Horstmann,
Altenglische Legenden (Heilbronn, 1881), pp. 1188. A new edition is in preparation by Carver. The
sources of the exempla are studied in Gordon H.Gerould, The North-English Homily Collection: A
Study of the Manuscript Relations and of the Sources of the Tales (1902). The suggestion (MLN,
XXII. 9596) that the work was based on Robert of Grethams Miroir has not been substantiated.
20
Ed. Theodor Erbe (1905; EETSES, 96).
21
Ed. Edward H.Weatherly (1936; EETS, 200). Space does not permit a discussion of the
large body of sermon literature that has been preserved from the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries. For this the reader must be referred to the two books of G.R.Owst mentioned
above. A collection of sermons formed at Oxford in the first half of the fifteenth century is
edited by Woodburn O.Ross, Middle English Sermons (1940; EETS, 209). Although preaching
in Latin was confined to sermons for monks and the clergy and scholarly audiences, many
The Prick
of
Conscience
Northern
Homily
Cycle
206
Life of
Christ
The
Passion
Cursor
Mundi
South
English
Legendary
In a day when the Bible was not a familiar book to the layman some form
of gospel harmony presenting the life of Christ was an appropriate substitute.
The Stanzaic Life of Christ is a long fourteenth-century poem, probably by a
monk of St. Werburghs abbey in Chester, who drew his material not from
the Bible but from Higdens Polychronicon and the Legenda Aurea. Apart
from exemplifying a type of religious omnibus it derives a certain interest
from having been used in the composition of the Chester Plays.22 Even more
popular were treatments of the Passion, of which two in Middle English have
come down to us. The Northern Passion 23 is much superior to the Southern
Passion, and is found also in Midland and Southern manuscripts. It is based
upon an Old French Passion, and in an expanded form is sometimes
incorporated in the Northern Homily Cycle. It was used in certain episodes
of both the York and the Towneley Plays. The Southern Passion 24 is always
found as part of the South English Legendary (discussed below) and seems to
have been written for this collection.
An attempt to cover the outstanding events of the Old as well as the New
Testament is the northern poem called the Cursor Mundi,25 because, as the
author explains, it runs over the whole world. It is one of the longest of the
omnibus poems, filling nearly 24,000 lines, with additional pieces at the end.
After a prologue in which the author explains his plan and his intention of
writing in English for the common people he divides his story into seven
ages, beginning with Creation and ending with the Last Judgment. He has
drawn his material from various sources, about a fifth from Herman of
Valenciennes Bible,26 other parts from Grossetestes Chteau dAmour,
Methodius, an Old French legend of the Holy Rood, and the Assumption of
the Virgin from a Southern English poem on the subject. What cannot be
otherwise accounted for is usually attributed to Peter Comestor (whom he
names), but we shall probably find some day other more immediate sources
for some of this matter. The work belongs to the last part of the thirteenth
century or early in the next.
What goes by the name of the South English Legendary 27 could almost
be described as a group of similar works having certain parts in common. It
is obviously a matter of gradual growth, undergoing modifications and
accretions for upwards of a hundred years. Like the Legenda Aurea, to
which it bears an obvious family likeness,28 it consists not only of saints
sermons preached in the vernacular are preserved only in Latin. A famous example is John Bromyards
Summa Predicantium of the middle of the fourteenth century.
22
See the edition of Frances A.Foster (1926; EETS, 166).
23
Ed. Frances A.Foster (191316; EETS, 145 and 147).
24
Ed. Beatrice Daw Brown (1927; EETS, 169).
25
Ed. Richard Morris (187478; EETS, 57, 59, 62, 66, 68).
26
Lois Borland, Hermans Bible and the Cursor Mundi SP, XXX (1933). 427444.
27
One manuscript that has been printed in full is Laud 108, daring 128090. It is edited by
C.Horstmann (1887; EETS, 87).
28
For a discussion of the possible influence of the Legenda Aurea on the English collection see
Minnie E.Wells, The South English Legendary in Its Relation to the Legenda Aurea PMLA, LI
(1936). 337360.
207
legends but narratives for important seasons in the ecclesiastical year. The
many manuscripts in which it was copied differ greatly in the number, choice,
and arrangement of items, but it is possible to see, along with the addition of
new legends, a gradual expansion of the biblical and apocryphal matter until,
in one of its later forms, the whole is divided into a Temporale and a Sanctorale
and arranged approximately in accordance with the calendar. Although the
earliest manuscript belongs to the end of the thirteenth century, the collection
can hardly have been begun before about 1275. There is reason to think that
it originally took shape in or near the abbey of Gloucester, and that the original
compilation was the work of a Franciscan.29 Probably many groups and
individuals, however, had a hand in it in the course of its development.
It is interesting to note how many of the works discussed in this chapter
belong to the north. The Cursor Mundi, the Northern Homily Cycle, and the
Northern Passion come to mind immediately. Thoresby was Archbishop of
York and John Gay try ge, who translated his Catechism, was a monk there.
While we no longer need to think of the Prick of Conscience as associated
with Rolle and Yorkshire, it is nevertheless a northern poem, and the
Nassyngton who wrote the Speculum Vitae was most likely an advocate in
the ecclesiastical court at York. The Stanzaic Life of Christ was probably
written at Chester, and the Handlyng Synne certainly in Lincolnshire. In this
list the northeast is especially prominent. We must recognize an active religious
ferment in any region which in addition could give birth to Wyclif and the
Lollard movement, call forth the great mystics, and produce the most
ambitious cycles of biblical plays.30
29
See Minnie E.Wells, as above, and her later article, The Structural Development of the South
English Legendary, JEGP, XLI (1942). 320344.
30
Space does not permit discussion of the collections of exempla for the use of preachers, such as
the Latin Liber Exemplorum (c. 1275), ed. A.G.Little (1908), Speculum Laicorum (c. 1285), ed.
J.T.Welter (Paris, 1914), and Fasciculus Morum (c. 1320?), still unpublished, or of collections translated
in the fifteenth century into English, like the Gesta Romanorum (EETSES, 33) and the Alphabet of
Tales (EETS, 126127). See T.F.Crane, introduction to The Exemplaof Jacques de Vitry (1890; FolkLore Soc. Pub., XXVI) and Mediaeval Sermon-Books and Stories and Their Study since 1883, Proc.
Amer. Philos. Soc., LVI (1917). 369402; J.T.Welter, LExemplum dans la littrature religieuse et
didactique du moyen ge (Paris, 1927); and J.H.Mosher, The Exemplum in the Early Religious and
Didactic Literature of England (1911).
Prominence
of the
North
XII
The Lyric1
Lyric Not
Common
in Old
English
or in
AngloNorman
Poetry
It is a commonplace of literary history that there is little or no lyric in the poetry

of the Anglo-Saxons. Such dramatic pieces as the Seafarer, the Husbands Message,
or the Wifes Lament, or such elegiac reflections as the Ruin are lyrical rather
than lyrics. Cdmons Hymn, Eadwacer, and Deor, the last so fine in its simple
unity and directness, come closest perhaps to the lyric in expressing the personal
emotion of the poet.2 But it is evident that Old English poetry found its most
natural expression in the epic and in other types of narrative verse.
Likewise the Normans seem to have been without a lyrical bent. If we are
to accept Gaston Pariss analysis of the Norman character,3 the Norman was
practical and business-like, earnest rather than gay. At all events, in the lyric
of northern France, that is, in the poetry of the trouvres, the Normans seem
to have played a very minor part. The same observation holds true for England.
In the very considerable body of Anglo-Norman poetry there are few secular
lyrics,4 and it does not seem that Continental specimens were often copied in
manuscripts written in England. During the period when French was the
predominant language of the upper class it would be useless to look for lyrics
of the French courtly type in English. The few lyrical fragments older than the
thirteenth century, such as St. Godrics Hymns and Cnuts Song,5 are of liturgical
and clerical inspiration. When, therefore, English secular lyrics begin to appear
about 1250, it is a little difficult to say precisely what are their antecedents.
1
A convenient introduction to the Middle English lyric is the little volume of Early English Lyrics
edited by E.K.Chambers and F.Sidgwick (1907) with an essay by Chambers on Some Aspects of the
Medival Lyric and a list of important manuscripts in which the lyrics are found. Carleton Browns
three volumes, English Lyrics of the XIII th Century (Oxford, 1932), Religious Lyrics of the XIV th
Century (Oxford, 1924), and Religious Lyrics of the XV th Century (Oxford, 1939), are indispensable
collections of texts, as is Richard L.Greenes The Early English Carols (1935). Richard Morris, An
Old English Miscellany (1872; EETS, 49) prints many of the older lyrics, and Thomas Wright and
J.O.Halliwell, Reliquiae Antiquae (18413) includes many isolated texts. Bddekers edition of poems
in MS Harl. 2253 is mentioned below; W. Heusers Die-Kildare-Gedichte (Bonn, 1904; Banner Beitrge
zur Anglistik, XIV) and The Minor Poems of the Vernon MS, ed. C.Horstmann and F.J.Furnivall (2V,
18921901; EETS, 98 and 117) should be noted. On special aspects of the Middle English lyric consult
Otto Heider, Untersuchungen zur mittelenglischen erotischen Lyrik (12501300) (Halle, 1905),
Alex.Mller, Mittelenglische geistliche u. weltliche Lyrik des XIII. Jahrhundertsnach Motiven
u.Formen (Halle, 1910), and the works mentioned in subsequent notes to this chapter.
2
On all of these pieces see Part I, above.
3
Gaston Paris, La Littrature normande avant lannexion (9121204) (Paris, 1899); see especially
pp. 1920 and 3940.
4
If the court referred to by Denis Piramus can be assumed to be the English court (see p. 137),
there may have been more Anglo-Norman secular lyrics than we know about.
5
See above, pp. 119120.
208
THE LYRIC
209
In considering the origins of the Middle English lyric we must of course

distinguish between religious and secular types. The religious lyric belongs to
an ecclesiastical and literary tradition which knows no national boundaries.
It is as wide as the Christian faith itself. The secular lyric, on the other hand,
could conceivably have roots in the native soil, or in Continental poetry
French or Provenalor in the secular Latin lyric which is conveniently, if
somewhat loosely, characterized by the term Goliardic.
In view of the scarcity just remarked of lyrics in Old English, any native
impulses that lie behind the Middle English lyric should presumably be sought
in folk and minstrel song. That popular songs, often accompanied by dancing,
were sung, especially by women, is sufficiently clear, although specimens of
the songs themselves are wholly lacking. The twelfth-century chronicler of
the deeds of Hereward the Exile tells us that women and girls sang of him in
their ring-dances.6 While this would suggest a ballad rather than a lyric, a
love song is unmistakably referred to in the story told in the same century by
Giraldus Cambrensis.7 A parish priest in Worcestershire, he says, had been
kept awake all night by dancers in the churchyard so that in the service the
next morning he sang the refrain
Genesis
of the
Middle
English
Lyric
Popular
Song
Swete lamman dhin are!

(Sweet leman, thy favor!) instead of Dominus vobiscum. Such references to
popular songs become more numerous in succeeding centuries.
There is no evidence of the direct influence of Provenal poetry upon the
English lyric, and little to make such influence probable.8 But the troubadour
lyric was widely imitated in northern France and certain conventions which
make a sporadic appearance in the English lyric could have reached England
by way of French poets. Possible Provenal influence is therefore part of a
larger questionhow much does the English lyric of the Middle Ages owe to
the lyric poetry of France?
To answer this question it is necessary to recall briefly the principal
types and general characteristics of the Old French lyric.9 It is customary
6
De Gestis Herwardi (ed. S.H.Miller, Peterborough, 1895, p. 12; Lestorie des Engles (1888; Rolls
Ser.), II. 344): Mulieres ac puellae de eo in choris canebant.
7
Gemma Ecclesiastica (Opera, Rolls Ser., II. 120).
8
See H.J.Chaytor, The Troubadours and England (Cambridge, 1923), especially pp. 2023 and ch.
in. J.Audiau, Les Troubadours et lAngleterre (2ed., 1927), while disposed to believe in the direct
imitation of the troubadours in England, admits that elle se cache le plus souvent sous des rminiscences
vagues et presque insaississables (p. 35). The resemblances pointed out by Elinor Rees, Provenal
Elements in the English Vernacular Lyrics of Manuscript Harley 2253, Stanford Studies in Lang. and
Lit. (1941), pp. 8195, are often commonplaces and are found equally in the poetry of the trouvres.
9
The student should consult Alfred Jeanroys Les Origines de la posie lyrique en France au moyen
ge (3ed., 1925) and the same authors chapter in L.Petit de Julleville, Histoire de la langue et de la
littrature franaise, I. 345404; Gaston Paris, Les Origines de la posie lyrique en France au moyen
ge, Jour. des Savants, 189192 (pub. separately, 1892); and the histories of Old French literature
mentioned on p. 110. A recent study is Guido Errante, Lirica romanza del primo secolo: un saggio d
inter pretazione (1943; Columbia Univ. diss.) On the Provenal lyric see A.Jeanroy, La Posie lyrique
des troubadours (2V, 1934) or the shorter treatments in H.J.Chaytor, The Troubadours (1912) and
J.Anglade, Les Troubadours: leurs vies, leurs uvres, leur influence (1908).
Provenal
Influence
Negligible
Old French
Types
210
Popular
Types
to distinguish two groups, the popular and the courtly.10 The former includes
certain of the more objective forms. The chanson de toile (also called chanson
dhistoire or romance) tells a story, generally of a young girl having a love
affair frowned upon by her parents, languishing for a distant lover, deserted
by one to whom she has given her love, etc. We should have to look for
analogous themes in English among the ballads, which the chanson de toile
resembles in the directness and economy with which it tells its story. In the
chanson de la mal marie the poet observes a woman rebellious against
marriage or lamenting her bondage to a husband she does not love. It is a
highly conventional type and is not found in the English lyric. The aube
(Prov. alba) is a lyric in which two lovers who have spent the night in each
others arms are forced to part by the coming of dawn, evident in the growing
light, the song of the lark, or the announcement of the watch. They try to
explain away the unwelcome signs and voice their annoyance over the
interruption of their love. The situation occurs in Chaucers Troilus 11 and is
familiar to everyone in Romeo and Juliet, in Juliets
Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day.
It was the nightingale, and not the lark.12
Courtly
Types
Popular in southern France, the aube is scarcely found in the north and is
quite unknown to the English lyric. Finally, there is the pastourelle,13 a very
distinctive type, and in this case one that was more popular among the
trouvres than with the troubadours. The poet, usually represented as a knight,
comes upon a shepherdess tending her flock in the fields and makes love to
her. There is always verbal fencing, ending either in easy success or in
disappointment which the poet turns off with cavalier grace. Not more than
three specimens have been found in England before 1500, none of them really
close to the French type. Thus, so far as the popular types of French lyric
are concerned, French influence upon the English lyric appears to be negligible.
Among the courtly types of French lyric there are numerous minor
varieties, which can be passed over quickly. The rondet or dance song, not
found in English, follows the form of the modern triolet, and the ballette,
ancestor of the ballade, does not appear in English until Chaucer introduced it
under the influence of fourteenth-century French poets (Machaut, Deschamps,
10
It may be questioned whether the distinction is well founded. Some scholars hold, however, that
the so-called popular types are not dependent on Provenal models. One of the oldest of these, the
rotrouenge, is omitted from consideration here because there is not sufficient evidence to justify a
definition. The term is thought to be used in Old French for any song with a refrain (P.Meyer, Romania,
XIX. 102; Jeanroy, ibid., XXX. 424). In like manner the reverdie must be rejected as a distinctive type,
although the celebration of the return of spring could well have formed the subject of lyrics in itself
besides being the introductory setting for the pastourelle and other forms.
11
III. 14151533 and 16951712.
12
On poems distantly related to the aube found in later English literature see Charles R. Baskervill,
English Songs on the Night Visit, PMLA, XXXVI (1921). 565614.
13
W.Powell Jones, The Pastourelle, A Study of the Origins and Tradition of a Lyric Type (Cambridge.
Mass., 1931).
THE LYRIC
211
etc.). The estampie,14 lai, descort,15 and motet16 are forms scarcely to be
identified in Middle English. The debate typestenson and jeu partiand
the personal or political serventois (Prov. sirventes) can be paralleled, but the
poetical debate and the political poem are such natural forms and are found
so early in the Latin poetry of the Middle Ages that it is doubtful whether we
should credit the English examples to French inspiration. All these types,
however, are of secondary importance. The courtly form par excellence of
the French lyric was the love song or chanson damour, the equivalent of the
Provenal canso.
More than half of all the Old French secular lyrics that have been preserved
are chansons. The chanson consists generally of five stanzas and an envoy,17
and the theme is always love. The universality of love as a subject for poetry
would suggest that here, if anywhere, the influence of France on the English
lyric could be exerted. The difference, however, between the French and the
English love-songs is more basic than the similarity. This difference begins
with the very conception of love itself that is revealed in the lyrics of the two
countries. The love of the chanson courtoise is courtly love, the devotion of
the poet to a married woman. The relation is that of vassal and overlord. The
lover is enlisted in the service of love. He expects the lady to be haughty and
capricious; he endures any hardship and suffers all in the desire to make
himself worthy of her. Love is for him a cult, and he expresses his devotion in
extolling the physical charms, the goodness, and the spiritual excellences of
the woman who is to him its major divinity. One would expect this poetry to
be full of fire and emotion. It is not. It is cold.18 The poet analyzes his emotions,
theorizes about the cause and effect of love, and finds enjoyment even in the
suffering which he endures. The monotony with which the chansons courtoises
repeat this conventional attitude is the fault with which they are most often
charged, and to pass to the English love-lyric is like stepping from makebelieve into the real world. Here we have no Frauendienst of the knightly
class, but feelings natural to two young people between whom there is no
social gulf. The English lyric is frank and outspoken. It looks forward to
marriage or the intimacies of possession:
He myhte sayen at Crist hym seze,
Pat myhte nyhtes neh hyre leze,
hevene he hevede here.
regarded
The poets affection is for a burde maiden in bower, a may, or a maide, or

his make. She is his sweet leman or his sweeting:
14
W.O.Streng-Renkonen, Les Estampies franaises (Paris, 1931; CFMA, 65). Lloyd Hibberd,
Estampie and Stantipes, Speculum, XIX (1944). 222249, is primarily concerned with the music.
15
A.Jeanroy, L.Brandin, and P.Aubry, Lais et descorts franais du XIII sicle (1901).
16
Originally a musical term, designating a song for several voices with different words for each.
See J.B.Beck, La Musique des troubadours (1910).
17
Sometimes six or seven stanzas. The number of lines in the stanza varies greatly.
18
Jeanroy in L.Petit de Julleville, Histoire de la langue et de la littrature franaise, I. 372.
The
Chanson
Courtoise
and
English
Love-Songs
212
Few Early
Secular
Lyrics
Alysoun
Love
Themes
Blow, northerne wynd,

Sent ou me my suetyng!
Blow, norerne wynd,
Blou! blou! blou!
He has no reason to conceal her identity: she is Annot, or Alysoun, or wone
by west.
In English secular lyrics that have been preserved are not numerous.19 One
of the most lilting of English songs is that in which the poet rejoices over the
good fortune that has let him fall in love with Alysoun:
Bytuen Mersh and Averil,
When spray biginne to springe,
e lutel foul ha hire wyl
little bird
On hyre lud to synge
voice
Ich libbe in love-longinge
For semlokest of alle inge;
seemliest
He may me blisse bringe,
She
Ich am in hire bandoun.
at her disposition
An hendy hap ichabbe y-hent fortunate chance I have got
Ichot from heuene it is me sent:
I know
From alle wymmen mi love is lent
departed
And lyht on Alysoun.
alighted
He describes her fair hair, brown eyes, her middel smal; no man can tell all
her goodness. His only fear is lest someone else should take her from him:
Icham for wowyng al forwake,
Wery so water in wore,
pond (weir)
Lest eny reve me my make.
depriveof
Ychabbe y-zerned zore.
for a long time
Better is olien whyle sore
to suffer
Pen mournen evermore.
Geynest under gore,
most gracious
Herkne to my roun.
song
An hendy hap ichabbe y-hent,
Ichot from hevene it is me sent:
From alle wymmen mi love is lent
And lyht on Alysoun.
A favorite occupation of the love poet in all times and places is to dwell
on his ladys graces. Besides entering incidentally into a number of lyrics,
such description makes up the whole of two early lyrics. In one the poet
boasts Ichot a burde in a bour ase beryl so bright and in five stanzas he
compares her successively to gems, flowers, various birds, and even to herbs
19
That more of the secular lyric has possibly been lost than is preserved is suggested by the socalled Rawlinson fragments. These are opening lines and stanzas (possibly in some cases complete
little poems) preserved in a single leaf of the early fourteenth century from what may well have been
some minstrels notebook. They are edited by W.Heuser, Fragmente von unbekannten
Spielmannsliedern des 14. Jahrhunderts, aus MS Rawl. D. 913, Anglia, XXX (1907). 173179.
THE LYRIC
213
medicinal to the body as she is medicine to his soul In the other he describes
her eyes, her merry mouth, her teeth, in fact her whole appearance. She has
lovely rede lippesromaunz forto rede and even hire neose ys set as hit
wel seme. One must not think, however, that medieval poets did not also
experience the sorrows of love. In a little thirteenth-century piece despair is
expressed in what must be close to the ultimate in condensation:
Foweles in e frith
woods
Pe fisses in e flod.
fishes
And I mon waxe wod.
mad
Mulch sorw I walk with
much sorrow
For beste of bon and blod.
In a lyric in the famous Harleian manuscript,20 from which some of the above
examples have been taken and which preserves most of the small number of
pre-Chaucerian love lyrics that have come down to us, the poet complains:
Wi longyng y am lad,
On molde y waxe mad,
earth
A maide marre me.
He protests that he loves her faithfully and will die before his time if she does
not show pity:
Levedi, wi al my miht
My love is on e liht,
To menske when y may,
honor
Pou rew & red me ryht!
To dee ou havest me diht:
Y deze longe er my day,
Pou leve upon my lay
believe
Treue ichave e plyht
To don at ich have hyht
promised
Whil mi lif leste may.
The sentiments expressed in these poems are those of lovers everywhere;
neither in thought or tone are we reminded of the French lyric. A common
French convention, however, represents the poet as wandering by the way
and coming unexpectedly upon a love adventure,21 and this convention is
reflected in one thirteenth-century lyric in another manuscript:
Nou sprinkes the sprai:
springs
Al for love icche am so seeke.
That slepen I ne mai.
20
Harl. 2253, a collection of pieces in French and English, of quite varied character, gathered
together about 1340, with greatest probability somewhere in Herefordshire. The English lyrics are all
in K.Bddeker, Altenglische Dichtungen des MS Harl. 2253 (Berlin, 1878). A number of graceful little
love poems are found in the works of Chaucer, but they follow a later convention.
21
For the French type as imitated in English, often at a very great distance, see the excellent study
of Helen E.Sandison, The Chanson dAventure in Middle English (Bryn Mawr, 1913).
214
Als I me rode this endre dai

O mi pleyinge
Seih I hwar a litel mai
Bigan to singge:
The clot him clingge!
Wai es him i lovve-longinge
Sal libben ai,
Nou sprinkes, etc.
Son icche herde that mirie note
Pider I drogh;
I fonde hire in an herber swot
Under a bogh
With joie inogh.
Son I asked, Thou mirie mai
Hwi sinkes-tou ai?
Nou sprinkes the sprai, etc.
Than answerde that maiden swote,
Midde wordes fewer
Mi lemman me haves bi-hot
Of lovve trewe;
He chaunges a newe.
Ziif I mae, it shal him rewe
Bi this dai!
Nou sprinkes, etc.
The
Cuckoo
Song
other day
saw
in
shall live
drew
sweet
singest thou
promised
The association of love with spring is older than the Middle Ages, but seems
to have had less meaning in classical times in the climate of the Mediterranean.
In the poetry of more northern countries, however, the return of warm weather
was greeted with an enthusiasm which is not always appreciated by the modern
reader, who controls his comfort with a thermostat. What is perhaps the
best-known lyric in Middle English, the famous Cuckoo Song (c. 1300), is a
simple outburst of joy at the return of Spring:
Sumer is i-cumen in,
Lhude sing, cuccu!
Groweth sed and bloweth med
And springth the wde nu.
Sing, cuccu!
Awe bleteth after lomb,
Lhouth after calve cu,
bulluc sterteth, bucke verteth;
Murie sing, cuccu,
Cuccu, cuccu!
Wel singes thu, cuccu,
Ne swik thu naver nu!
woods
ewe
cow
leaps up
THE LYRIC
215
This delightful song, with all the freshness of popular poetry, is set to music
of an elaborate kind 22 with Latin directions for singing by several voices (as
a round). As spring brought enjoyment of the out of doors, so winter aroused
very different emotions. In the opening stanza of a lyric, of which unfortunately
the rest has been cut away in the manuscript, the season is made to symbolize
the poets sorrowful mood over some wrong which he has suffered:
Mirie it is while sumer ilast
With fugheles song,
Oc nu necheth windes blast
And weder strong.
Ej! ej! what this nicht is long,
And ich wid wel michel wrong
Soregh and murne and fast.
but now nigheth

howlong
sorrow and mourn
It is to be regretted that we have relatively few secular lyrics preserved. The

great bulk of the Middle English lyricand its bulk is greatis religious or
moral. We should hasten to add, however, that the religious lyrics are almost
always touching in their sincerity, often imaginative in conception, and
occasionally startle us by their sheer beauty. In spite of the fact that most of
them involve some form of appeal to Christ or the Virgin Mary for salvation
or intercession, they take a great variety of shapes.23 If they suffer somewhat
from the uniformity of their devotional appeal, we must remember that the
piety and religious fervor which produced them are the guarantee of their
emotional validity.
The simplest form of lyric addressed to the Virgin is that in which the
poet sings her praises. She is most often described as the mild mother,
Queen of Heaven, angels bliss.24 She has come of high kin and is without
spot or blemish. Sometimes we hear echoes of the secular love poem: she
is flower of all and brightest in bower. Thy love is ever alike new.
Often praise is mingled with prayer as in the charming poem which begins
22
See the account by Dom Anselm Hughes in Groves Dictionary of Music and Musicians (3ed.),
where it is described as the oldest known canon, the oldest known six-part composition, etc. A facsimile
of the manuscript is reproduced as the frontispiece of Vol. v. The date usually given (c, 1240) rests on
an untenable inference. Manfred F.Bukofzer, Sumer Is Icumen In: A Revision (Berkeley, 1944; Univ.
of Calif. Pub. in Music, Vol. II. No. 2), offers strong arguments against so early a date for the music,
which he puts about 1310. This seems a little late linguistically for the lyric. See also Carleton Brown,
English Lyrics of the XIIIth Century, pp. xv ff., for the testimony of Giraldus Cambrensis as to the
existence of counter-point in Wales and Yorkshire c. 1190.
23
Consult F.A.Patterson, The Middle English Penitential Lyric: A Study and Collection of Early
Religious Verse (1911), Heinrich Corsdress, Die Motive der mittelenglischen geistlichen Lyrikund
ihr Verhltnis zur lateinischen Hymnologie des Mittelalters (Weimar, 1913), and Samuel Singer, Die
religise Lyrik des Mittelalters (Bern, 1933).
24
Among the poems, mostly doctrinal, of William of Shoreham, vicar of Chart-Sutton in Kent (c.
1325) is a graceful little hymn to the Virgin, there attributed to Robert Grosseteste, in which the
Virgin is described as the dove of Noah that brought back the olive branch, the bush of Sinai, the
temple of Solomon, etc. Shorehams poems were edited by Thomas Wright for the Percy Soc. (1849)
and more recently by M.Konrath (1902; EETSES, 86).
The
Religious
Lyric
Lyrics
Addressed
to the
Virgin
216
Of on that is so fayr and brizt

velud maris Stella
Brizter than the day is lizt,
parens et puella,
Ic crie to the, thou se to me,
Levedy, preye thi sone for me
tam pia,
That ic mote come to the,
Maria.
Underlying all such appeals is the thought of the Virgin as the link between
God and mankind, a thought which occasionally takes a novel turn:
Thou my sister and mother
And thy son my brother
Who should then drede?
Who-so haveth the king to brother
And eke the queen to mother
Well ought for to spede.25
The Virigin
as Subject
Almost all the circumstances of the Virgins life were the subject of poems. There
are poetical accounts of the Annunciation, like the blind John Audelays 26
The angel to the vergyn said,
Entreng into here boure,
Fore drede of quakyng of this mayd,
He said, haile! with gret honour,
Haile! be thou quene of maidyns mo,
Lord of heven and erth also
Among numerous poems on the Five Joys, one in the Harleian manuscript is
interesting for its use of the conventional French opening already illustrated
in the secular lyric and now become a matter of meaningless habit:
Ase y me rod this ender day
By gren wode to sech play,
Mid herte y thohte al on a may,
Suetest of all thinge.
Lythe & ichou tell may
listen
Al of that swet thinge.
With al mi lif y love that may, the poet says and proceeds to comment on
the Annunciation, the Birth of Christ, the Resurrection, the Ascension, and
the Virgins own Assumption into heaven as the moments of greatest joy in
her life.
25
In quoting from lyrics, especially of the fifteenth century, I have sometimes slightly modernized
the spelling where no harm is done to the metre or rime.
26
John Audelay (c. 1425) was a monk of Haghmond Abbey, near Shrewsbury. He is the author of
fifty-five didactic and devotional poems. The best edition is that of Ella K.Whiting, The Poems of John
Audelay (1931; EETS, 184).
THE LYRIC
217
Some of the most effective lyrics, both of the Virgin and of Christ, are
those in which the mood is portrayed dramatically, in monologue or dialogue
form. There is a charming dialogue between the Virgin and her Child,
beginning
As I lay upon a night
Alone in my longing,
Methought I saw a wonder sight,
A maiden child rocking.
The maiden would withouten song
Hir child o sleep bring;
The child thought she did him wrong,
And bade his moder sing.
Sing now, moder, said that child,
What me shall befall
Here-after when I come to eld
So don modres all.
Each a moder truly
That kan her cradle keep
Is wont to lullen lovely
& singen her child o sleep.
Swet moder, fair & fre,
Sithen that it is so,
I pray the that thou lulle me
& sing somewhat there-to.
In response to this request Mary relates the events from the Annunciation to
the birth of the Christ-child, and he continues prophetically with an outline
of his own life, ending in his death and resurrection. In the final stanza the
poet tells us that the vision came to him on Christmas day:
Certainly this sight I say,
saw
This song i herd sing,
As I lay this Yules-day
Alone in my longing.
One of the most beautiful of Middle English lyrics, certainly of those
concerning the Virgin, begins:
Suddenly afraid,
Half waking, half sleeping,
And greatly dismayed,
A woman sat weeping.
It is the Virgin, weeping over the body of Christ:
With favor in her face far passing my reason,
And of her sore weeping this was the encheson
cause
Her son in her lap lay, she said, slain by treason.
If weeping might ripe be, it seemed then in season.
Dramatic
Lyrics
218
Jhesu! so she sobbed;

So her Son was bobbed
And of his life robbed,
Saying these words, as I say thee:
Who cannot weep, come learn of me.
Lyrics to
Christ
beaten
Three more stanzas reveal the Virgins grief, partly in dialogue with the poet,
each rising to the same thoughtWho cannot weep, come learn of me.27
As with lyrics of the Virgin, so in poems addressed to Christ we have
songs of simple praise. A poem taking its theme from the well-known hymn
long attributed to St. Bernard, the Jesu Dulcis Memoria, begins:
Ihesu, swete is the love of thee,
Noon othir thing so swete may be;
No thing that men may heere & see
Hath no swetnesse azens thee.
and continues as a rosary of fifty stanzas. It is an example of devotion put in
the form of meditation. Another lyric of similar intent may have been written
by a woman:
Now I see blostme spring
I herde a fuheles song;
A swete longing
Myn herte throughout sprong
That is of love newe
That is so swete and trewe
It gladdeth all my song
blossom
birds
The song is of Christ; alas, that I cannot turn all my thought to him and make
him my leman! It is an expression of spiritual yearning, and the prayer in the
closing stanza begins with the words
lesu, leman sweet,
I send thee this song.
Christ as lover is the theme of the Franciscan Thomas of Hales Love Rune
mentioned above (p. 123), Among simple appeals to Christ for help and
salvation Richard Caisters Ihesu, lord, at madist me at the beginning of the
fifteenth century was deservedly popular, as seventeen manuscripts show.28
The most beautiful of the religious lyrics is the Quia amore langueo,
beginning:
27
On laments of the Virgin see H.Thien, ber die englischen Marienklagen (Kiel, 1906) and for
their Continental background E.Wechssler, Die romanischen Marienklagen (Halle, 1893).
28
On the author see the Rev. Dundas Harford, Richard of Caister, and his Metrical Prayer,
Norfolk Archology, XVII (1910). 221244.
THE LYRIC
219
In a valey of this restles minde

I soughte in mounteine and in mede,
Trusting a trewe love for to finde.
Upon an hill than I took hede;
A voice I herde, and neer I yede,
In huge dolour complaininge tho,
See, dere soule, how my sides blede,
Quia amore langueo.
The poet comes upon a man wounded and sitting under a tree. It is Christ
true love that fals was neveresuing for mans soul. She has left him and
is hard to woo, but
I wole abide till sche be redy;
I wole her sue if sche seie nay;
The poem parallels the secular love complaints:
Fair love, lete us go pleye!
Apples ben ripe in my gardaine.
I schal thee clothe in a newe aray;
Thy mete schall be milk, hony, and wine.
Fair love, let us go digne!
dine
Thy sustenaunce is in my crippe, lo!
scrip
Tarie thou not, my faire spouse mine,
Quia amore langueo.
He will care for her always:
Mine owne wife, go not me fro!
Thy meede is marked whan thou art mort,
dead
Quia amore langueo.
Quia
Amore
Langueo
It is but a step from the devotional lyric to poems of moral reflection and
admonition. Many of these spring from the thought, sometimes used as a
refrain, Timor mortis conturbat me. They stress the transitoriness of worldly
pleasures:
Wynter wakeneth al my care,
Nou this levs waxeth bare;
Ofte y sike & mourn sare
sigh
When hit cometh in my thoht
Of this worldes joiehow hit geth al to noht.
Man is but dust. Why should he be proud? This is the theme of the famous
Earth upon Earth, which was often copied and exists in many forms: 29
Erthe upon erthe is wonderly wrought
Erthe upon erthe hath worship of nought
Erthe upon erthe hath set all his thought
How erthe upon erthe might be high brought.
Reflective
and
Admonitory Poems
29
Hilda M.R.Murray, The Middle English Poem, Erthe upon Erthe, printed from Twentyfour
Manuscripts (1911; EETS, 141).
220
Similar is the reflection Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt:

Where beth they biforen us weren
Hounds ladden and havcks beren
And hadden feld and wode?
ledhawks bore
Where are those rich ladies in their bower, wearing gold in their hair? They
ate and drank and made merry, but in the twinkling of an eye their souls were
lost. Where now is that laughter and song?
Lyrics in which the poet reflects on the Passion and Resurrection, and
dwells on the sacrifice Christ has made for man are very numerous. Particularly
melodious is one beginning:
Somer is comen & winter gon
This day biginnith to longe,
& this fouls everichon
Joye hem wit songe.
So stronge kare me bint,
Al wit joye that is funde
In londe,
Al for a child
That is so milde
Of honde.
binds
Christ is often represented as appealing to man, complaining that man has

rejected him, and offering mercy freely to those who will accept it. One such
dramatic lyric begins:
Undo thi dore, my spouse dere,
Allas! wy stond I loken out here?
Fre am I thi make.
Loke mi lokkes & ek my heved
& al my bodi with blod beweved
For thi sake.
Allas! allas! hevel have I sped
For senne Iesu is fro me fled,
Mi trewe fere.
With-outen my gate he stant alone,
Sorfuliche he maket his mone
On his manere.
locked
enveloped
sin
evil
companion
Reflections such as this led one poet to contemplate a baby crying in its crib,
sorrowfully:
Lollai, lollai, litil child, whi wepistou so sore?
Nedis mostou wepe, hit was izarkid the zore
Ever to lib in sorow, and sich and mourne evere,
As thin eldren dider this, whil hi alives were.
Lollai, lollai, litil child, child lolai, lullow,
Into uncuth world icommen so ertow.
prepared for
sigh
they
unknown
THE LYRIC
221
Beasts and birds and fishes in the flood are fortunate when they come into
the world, but man is born to sorrow. After five stanzas the poet concludes:
Child, thou nert a pilgrim bot an uncuthe gist
unknown guest
Thi dawes beth itold, thi jurneis beth icast;
days are numbered
Whoder thou salt wend north other est
whether
Deth the sal betide with bitter bale in brest.
shall
Lollai, lollai, litil child, this wo Adam the wrozt,
Whan he of the appil ete, and Eve hit him betacht.
handed
A more cheerful note is brought into the fifteenth century by the rapid The
Carol rise to popularity of the carol 30 associated with Christmas and Epiphany.
It is a time of rejoicing:
Now may we singen as it is
Quod puer natus est nobis.
Often the theme is the simple story of Christs birth:
Make we mery in hall & bowr,
Thys tyme was born owr Savyowr.
In this tyme God hath sent
Hys own Son, to be present,
To dwell with us in verament,
God that ys owr Savyowr.
In this tyme that ys be-fall,
A child was born in an ox stall
& after he dyed for us all,
God that ys owr Savyowr.
In this tyme an angell bryght
Mete III shepherdis upon a nyght,
He bade them go anon ryght
To God that ys owr Saviowr.
In thys tyme now pray we
To hym that dyed for us on tre,
On us all to have pytee,
God that ys owr Saviowr.
But we have also carols celebrating merely the joyful spirit of the season:
Make we mery, bothe more & lasse
For now ys the tyme of Crystymas.
Lett no man cum in to this hall,
Grome, page, nor yet marshall,
But that sum sport he bryng with-all,
For now ys the tyme of Cristemas.
30
For an interesting theory concerning the origin of the word see Margit Sahlin, tude sur la
carole mdivale: lorigine du mot et ses rapports avec lglise (Uppsala, 1940).
The Carol
222
If that he say he can not syng,

Some oder sport then lett hym bryng,
That it may please at this festing,
For now is the time of Cristemas.
If he say he can nowght do,
Then for my love aske him no mo,
But to the stokkes then let hym go,
For now is the time of Cristemas.
Political,
Satirical,
and
Convivial
Songs
Space does not permit more than a passing reference to the political poems
which offer editorial comment on current events,31 or to those comments,
often satirical, upon abuses of the time and the weaknesses of an erring
humanity.32 Nor is there need to speak of the shorter poems of Chaucer,
whose more important work is treated elsewhere, or of Lydgate who is likewise
discussed in another place.33 It would be pleasant to touch on the small number
of humorous, satirical, and convivial songs which appear toward the end of
the Middle English period. One answers the question when to trust a woman
by suggesting, when nettles in winter bear roses red, and thorns bear figs by
nature, when laurels bear cherries, when sparrows build churches, when
wrens carry sacks to the mill, and other possibilities equally likely. There is
the lament of the man married to a shrewish wife:
All that I may swink or swete,
My wife it will both drink and etc
and the warning to young men not to marry.
A drinking song such as
Tapster, fille another ale.
Anonne have I do.
God sende us good sale;
Avale the stake, avale!
drink down the pledge(?)
31
An example is the Song of Lewes written by a sympathizer with Simon de Montfort after his
victory in the battle of Lewes (1264). It is directed at the Kings brother, Richard, Earl of Cornwall,
each stanza ending:
Richard, thah thou be ever trichard [traitor]

Tricchen shall thou nevermore!
See the edition of C.L.kingsford (Oxford, 1890). Many political songs have a narrative base, as, for
example, those of Laurence Minot concerning incidents between 1333 and 1352. Minots poems have
been often edited; the best edition is that of Joseph Hall (Oxford, 1897). For collections of political
songs, in Latin, French, and English, see Thomas Wright, The Political Songs of England, from the
Reign of John to that of Edward II (1839; Camden Soc., VI); Thomas Wright, Political Poems and
Songs relating to English Historyfrom the Accession of Edw. III. to that of Ric. II (2v, 185961;
Rolls Ser.); cf. also Livingston Corson, A Finding List of Political Poems Referring to English Affairs
of the XIII and XIV Centuries (n.d.; Univ. of Penna. diss.).
32
See for examples the poems in Carleton Brown, Religious Lyrics of the XIVth Century, pp. 152
ff., one of which expresses the idea that the world is run by flattery and dissembling, another speaks
with mild bitterness of fair-weather friends, etc.
33
For Richard Rolle, who wrote a small number of lyrics, see ch. XIII. A conscientious but uninspired
versifier, James Ryman (c. 1490) has left a large number of devotional poems, which are edited by
Zupitza in Archiv, LXXXIX (1892). 167338.
THE LYRIC
223
Here is good ale ifounde.

Drinke to me,
And I to thee,
And lette the cuppe go rounde
reminds us that conviviality has expressed itself in song in practically all
periods of literature.
Most of our early lyrics are anonymous. Some show the same kind of variations
between texts as we find in the ballads and these variants have apparently arisen
in the course of oral transmission.34 It is natural to attribute most of the religious
pieces to clerkly authorship,35 but it is not impossible that some of the secular
love songs, too, were written in the shadow of the church. Jolly Absolon had
many brothers, and the spirit of the English secular lyric finds its closest parallel
in the Latin love songs of the scholares vagantes.36 The earlier Middle English
lyrics were intended for the ear rather than the eye. Many of them are accompanied
in the manuscripts by music,37 and we should make liberal allowance for the loss
which they suffer in being deprived of their melody. Few popular songs of our
own day, similarly stripped, would stand up so well.
In the later fourteenth century and certainly in the fifteenth the lyric becomes
increasingly literary.38 From the village green and the great hall it passes to
the study. Spontaneity at times gives way to the gracefully turned conceit. At
times the imaginative quality becomes genuinely arresting. The fifteenthcentury poet was unwittingly looking forward to Alan Seegers I Have a
Rendezvous with Death when he wrote:
Farewell, this world! I take my leave forever!
I am arrested to appear at Godds face.39
Philosophy takes its place beside religion; the poet is as likely to address
Fortune as God:
A! Mercy, Fortune, have pitee on me,
And thynke that thu hast done gretely amysse
To parte asondre them which ought to be
Alwey in one; why hast thu doo thus?
Have I offendyd the? I, nay ywysse!
Then torne thy whele and be my frende agayn,
And send me joy where I am nowe in payn.
34
See the various texts of the Alma Redemptoris Mater, beginning As I lay upon a night, in
Greene, pp. 1667.
35
For the importance of the Franciscans as authors of the religious lyric see Rossell H. Robbins,
The Authors of the Middle English Religious Lyrics, JEGP, XXXIX (1940). 230238, and The
Earliest Carols and the Franciscans, MLN, LIII (1938). 239245.
36
For references see p. 149, note 15.
37
An important collection of facsimiles with transcriptions is in Sir John Stainers Early Bodleian
Music (2V, 1901).
38
Extensive collections of fifteenth-century lyrics are edited to Bernhard Fehr in Archiv, CVI, CVII,
and CIX.
39
Brown, Religious Lyrics of the XV th Century, p. 236.
Authorship
Late
Tendencies
224
And thynke what sorowe is the departyng

Of two trewe hertis lovyng feithfully,
For partyng is the most soroughfull thynge,
To myn entent, that ever yet knewe I.
Therefore, I pray to the right hertely
To turne thy whele and be my frende agayn,
And send me joy where I am now in payn.40
With such a lyric as this we look forward to the poetry of the Renaissance.
40
Ibid., p. 262.
XIII
Richard Rolle and Other Mystics
Mysticism1 is the most intense form of personal religious experience. In
Christian mysticism the individual seeks through solitary contemplation to
enter into direct communion with God or to attain spiritual union with God.
In such union, with its accompanying illumination, the will seems temporarily
in abeyance and the individual is in a state of complete though receptive
passivity. The experience is by nature transient, and above all, it is ineffable:
it cannot be expressed in words or conveyed from one person to another.
The mystic state is not an experience into which one can enter at will.
When St. Paul said that he was caught up to the third heaven, he meant, as
St. Bernard observed, that he could not have attained such rapture by any
strength or toil of his own. One must hear the call of God, after which
grace supplies the strength that is lacking in the individual. Once the
awakening has taken place, there are three stages, generally speaking,
through which the soul must pass. The first is Purgation. Pure truth is seen
only with a pure heart. By sanctity of life, sincere repentance, and an
intense desire for holiness the obstacles are removed which stand in the
way of the souls progress. The second stage, known as Illumination, is that
in which the mind detaches itself from outer sensations and yields in complete
surrender to the will of God. The soul prepares itself, as it were, for union
with the Divine Presence. Meditation is the basis of mystical detachment
and one who hopes to attain to the highest of the mystical states should, in
the words of Rolle, accustom himself to meditation and devout prayer
before he reaches out to the contemplation of heavenly joys. For Rolle,
meditation on the Passion seemed the most fitting form which such
devotion could take. The final stage, known as Contemplation, is that in
which the soul is brought into the presence of God and becomes one with
God. It is a state of ecstasy or vision, incapable of being described in
words, generally one of the purest and intensest joy. It is in this stage that
the individual sometimes sees visions, hears voices, and experiences those
1
The student of English mysticism can begin with two small but excellent books: Dom David
Knowles, The English Mystics (1927) and Evelyn Underhill, The Mystics of the Church (n.d.). Dom
Cuthbert Butlers Western Mysticism (1922) contains liberal extracts from St. Augustine, St. Gregory
the Great, and St. Bernard. More extended discussions of mysticism are Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism
(1911), and W.R.Inge, Christian Mysticism (1899). See also William James, The Varieties of Religious
Experience (1902), Lectures XVI and XVII, and Arthur Devine, A Manual of Mystical Theology (1903).
Francis D.S.Darwin, The English Medieval Recluse (1944), gives a general picture of the recluse in a
brief and popular form.
225
Definition
The Three
Stages
226
Necessarily
Personal
The
Fourteenth
Century
abnormal psychic phenomena which appear so persistently in the history of

the mystics.2 For the mystical experience also yields knowledge and
comprehension of spiritual things, truth intuitively perceived. Truth is revealed
to the contemplative soul as material things are visible to the bodily eye. The
mystic reward is thus not only the personal joy felt in being present in spirit
with God, but at times the deeper understanding of spiritual truth.
As we have already observed, mysticism is in the highest degree personal.
The contemplative experience must come from within and is a manifestation
of divine grace. It is not communicable. One might suppose, therefore, that
since mystic exaltation begins and ends with the individual, there would be no
occasion for putting it into words. There are several reasons why this is not so.
In the first place, the inner light that the mystic attains is felt to be authoritative,
and we can understand the impulse to share his insight with others and perhaps
lead others to a similar desire for inner illumination. Again, the mystic in the
light of his experience may feel that he is in a position to instruct others in the
way to contemplative joy. And finally, the mystic is not unlike the poet in his
wish to give permanence to the things that he has felt deeply and to give vent to
his joy in the outpouring of his emotion. Hence the very considerable body of
mystical writingautobiographical, didactic, lyrical.
The fourteenth century is the great age of mysticism, not only in England
but in other parts of Europe as well.3 Whether, as has been suggested, it was
a reaction against the extremes of scholasticism or a part of the general
religious awakening discussed in a previous chapter, it reflects the mystics
dissatisfaction with casual observances and the ordinary forms of worship
any long psalter unmindfully mumbled in the teeth, as the Cloud of
Unknowing puts it. Rolle contrasts the fervor of the contemplative with the
lukewarm devotion of the monks. Mysticism reflects the craving for a more
eager, personal spirituality having its source in the individual. It must not be
thought, however, that the flowering of mysticism in the fourteenth century
is a sudden phenomenon. Its roots reach back to apostolic times, and the
mystical tradition in the west descends from St. Augustine and (Pseudo)
Dionysius the Areopagite to the great triumvirate, St. Bernard, Richard of St.
Victor, and St. Bonaventura.4
2
Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, p. 319.

In Germany there were Meister Eckhard (d. 1327), John Tauler (d. 1361), and Henry Suso (d.
1365), to mention only the greatest. In Flanders Jan Ruysbrock died in 1381, and in Italy we have
Jacopone da Todi (d. 1306), who belongs mostly to the preceding century, and St. Catherine of Siena,
who died in 1380.
4
The mysticism of St. Bernard is found chiefly in his Sermons on the Canticles (Eng. trans., 2v,
Dublin, 1920), in which the fifteenth sermon is particularly significant; in The Love of God (trans.
Edmund G.Gardner, 1916; T.L.Connolly, 1937); and in The Steps of Humility (ed. and trans. by
Geo.B.Burch, Cambridge, Mass., 1940). Richard of St. Victors masterpiece is the De Gratia
Contemplations, commonly known as Benjamin Major, in five books. Benjamin Minor, a shorter treatise,
serves as a kind of introduction to the larger. An English version of the Benjamin Minor, dating from
the middle of the fourteenth century, is printed in Horstman, Yorkshire Writers, I. 162172. A later
version can also be had in Edmund G. Gardner, The Cell of Self Knowledge (1910). The four Degrees
of Burning Love has not been translated. Mystical writings form but a small part of St. Bonaventuras
works. Most important is the De Triplici Via, sometimes known as the Incendium Amoris (in Vol. VIII
3
RICHARD ROLLE AND OTHER MYSTICS
227
English mysticism finds its first formal expression in the writings of Richard
Rolle, hermit of Hampole.5 The account of his awakening some time in early
manhood is best quoted in his own words:
Richard
Rolle
I was sitting forsooth in a chapel and whilst I was delighting in the sweetness of
prayer or meditation, suddenly I felt a merry and unknown heat in me. At first
I was uncertain, doubting from whom it should be. After a long time I became
convinced that it was not of a creature but of my Maker, for more hot and
gladder I found it.
Whilst truly I sat in the same chapel and sang psalms as I might in the evening
before supper, I perceived, as it were, the sounds of readers or rather singers
above me. Whilst also I took heed, praying to heaven with all desire, suddenly,
in what manner I know not, I felt in me the noise of song and was aware of the
most pleasing heavenly melody, which dwelt with me in my mind. Forsooth my
thought was changed to continual mirth of sound and thenceforth for fullness
of inward sweetness I burst out singing what before I saidforsooth privily and
only before my Maker.
Wherefore from the beginning of my changed soul unto the high degree of
Christs love which, God granting, I was able to attain, in which degree I might
sing the love of God with joyful song, was four years and about three months.6
From this time on, his life was spent in the exercise of pietymeditation,
prayer, writing, and giving spiritual comfort to others.
Rolles more important mystical writings are in Latin.7 One of the most
significant, the Melos Amoris, often called Melum Contemplativorum and
also known as the Book of the Glory and Perfection of the Saints, has only
lately been published (see Supplement). It is an extensive account of his
mystical joy, written in a highly mannered prose hard to reconcile with the
genuineness and intensity of feeling which it expresses. There are
autobiographical passages indicating that his mode of life was not free from
of the standard edition, Opera Omnia, Quaracchi, 18821902). A work commonly attributed to him
in the Middle Ages, the Meditationes Vitae Christi, but not his, had great influence. A brief section
(chs. 7492) was turned into English by an anonymous follower of Rolle as The Privity of the Passion
(Horstman, I. 198218), modernized in Geraldine E.Hodgson, Some Minor Works of Richard Rolle
with The Privity of the Passion (1923), and large portions were Englished by Nicholas Love before
1410 as The Mirrour of the Blessed Lyf of Jesu Christ (ed. Lawrence F.Powell, 1908).
5
What we know of Rolles life, apart from autobiographical allusions in his writings, comes from
the Office of St. Richard Hermit compiled in hope of his canonization at the end of the fourteenth
century. It is supposed that he was born about 1300 at Thornton Dale, some forty miles from York. He
was for a time at Oxford, but returned home at eighteen for religious reasons. Improvising a hermits
dress from his fathers rain hood and two of his sisters kirtles, he went off by himself, leaving his
sister convinced that he was mad. He was taken in by a family named Dalton, where he was given a
solitary cell or room, and there composed some of his earlier works. After he left the Daltons his
movements cannot be traced very definitely, but we may be sure that he pursued a solitary life most of
the time. He lived for a while in the archdeaconry of Richmondshire, but at the end of his life he was
at Hampole, in southwest Yorkshire. It is supposed that his death in September, 1349 was due to the
plague. For a translation of the Office see F.M.M.Comper, The Fire of Love (1914), pp. xlv-lviii.
6
Incendium Amoris, ch. xv, adapted from the translation made by Richard Misyn (1435).
7
The definitive study of the Rolle canon is Hope Emily Allen, Writings Ascribed to Richard Rolle,
Hermit of Hampole, and Materials for His Biography (1927; MLA Monograph Ser., in). For a briefer
account see the same authors intro. to English Writings of Richard Rolle, Hermit of Hampole (1931)
and Frances M.M.Comper, Life of Richard Rolle (1929).
Latin
Writings
228
Calor,
Canor,
Dulcor
criticism and attack. His best known works are the Incendium Amoris, written
in middle life, and the somewhat later Emendatio Vitae.8 It is from the former
of these that we have quoted the account of his initiation into the mystical
experience. The Mending of Life offers practical advice on the means to grace,
through despising the world, embracing poverty, cultivating humility, and
the like. The last chapter treats the joys of the contemplative life.
Rolle seems to have acquired disciples and he became in time the spiritual
adviser to certain holy womena nun of Yedingham, one of Hampole, and a
recluse named Margaret Kirkby. For them he wrote his three. English epistles
on the love of God and its attainment through contemplationEgo Dormio,
Commandment of the Love of God, and the Form of Living. They are among
his latest works, and the Form of Living, written for Margaret Kirkby, is of
the three the most orderly and mature exposition of his views.9
For Rolle joy in e life of Jhesu is the keynote of his mysticism, in
which the loving contemplation of the Holy Name of Jesus has its part. The
tokens of his mystical union were Calor, Canor, and DulcorHeat, which
signifies not merely burning love but the physical sensation of warmth;
Song, which means that his soul was filled with heavenly music and he
responded in spiritual melody; Sweetness, which means a sense of
inexpressible joy felt in the soul. The sensuous character of Rolles
contemplative experience together with the fact that it seems to have been
present not intermittently but more or less constantly has led some to
question his place in the inner circle of mystics. Nevertheless his reputation
for piety and the character and extent of his writings make him a figure of
the greatest importance in the spiritual revival of the fourteenth century.
This is not the same as saying that he occupies a place of equal importance
in English literature. His literary reputation until recently has rested in no
small measure on a work, the Prick of Conscience, which he did not write.
His few lyrics have in them more piety than poetry, and his English treatises,
though written in competent prose, are less important than his Latin writings.
Though his Meditations on the Passion has passages of deep feeling
expressed with simple fervor, and his translation of the Psalter with its
accompanying commentary was widely read until the time of the
Reformation, we must conclude that his importance lies mainly in his influence
on later mystics and on subsequent religious thought We miss in his work
those personal qualities that endear the author of the Ancrene Riwle to us. Great
8
These two works are available in English versions, The Fire of Loveand The Mending of Life,
ed. Frances M.M.Comper (1914). Several other modern versions of the Mending of Life have been
published. G.C.Heseltine, Selected Works of Richard Rolle, Hermit (1930), is useful. Most of the texts
in Geraldine E.Hodgsons Some Minor Works of Richard Rolle (1923) are no longer thought to be by
Rolle, but are useful as illustrating English mysticism in the fourteenth century.
9
All three epistles are printed in H.E.Allen, English Writings of Richard Rolle, and in Horstman,
Yorkshire Writers, I. 371. The Form of Living has been published in modernized form by G.E.Hodgson
(1910).
229
as was his piety and admirable his devotion to an ideal, Rolles personality as
it emerges from his writings was too severe and uncompromising to leave
with the reader the pleasing sense of grace or charm.
Uncompromising in a different way is the unknown author of the Cloud
of Unknowing,10 one of the most spiritual of the mystical treatises of the
fourteenth century. He is firm in his aloofness, writing not for all and sundry
but for the chosen few who have an inclination towards the contemplative
life and have even made some progress towards it. Specifically he addresses a
young man of twenty-four. He rules out worldly praters, open praisers or
blamers of themselves or of any other,and all manner of carpers: cared I
never that they saw this book. For mine intent was never to write such thing
unto them. His single theme is the love of God and the perception of the
Divine Presence through a quiet spirituality. Our own ignorance and Gods
incomprehensibility are like a great cloud (the cloud of unknowing), which is
between God and the soul, which the soul beats upon in its yearning for God,
and through which God may at times send a gleam into the heart. He is
scornful of those who stare as though they were mad,hang their heads on
one side, as if a worm were in their ears,gape with their mouthsor row
with their arms in the time of their speaking, as though they needed to swim
over a great water. Such physical manifestations are mere hypocrisy. The
true contemplative is unostentatious, with a soft and demure behavior as
well in body as in soul. We are completely at a loss to identify this remarkable
author, although he has also left us a half dozen shorter treatises including a
translation of the Mystica Theologia of Pseudo-Dionysius and an Epistle of
Privy Counsel which in some ways is finer than his major work.11 It is supposed
that he wrote about 1350 although a fairly clear allusion to the Lollards in
the Cloud of Unknowing has not been accounted for in an entirely satisfactory
way.
Writing somewhat later in the century, Walter Hilton, an Augustinian
canon of Thurgarton (Notts.) who died in 1396, produced the Scale (or
Ladder) of Perfection and a number of shorter works.12 Hilton writes for a
nun who had become a recluse, although he also had a larger audience in
mind. The whole spirit and approach make the Scale of Perfection strikingly
different from the Cloud of Unknowing.13 Where the author of the latter
10
The Middle English text is edited by Phyllis Hodgson, The Cloud of Unknowing and The Book,
of Privy Counselling (1944; EETS, 218). For modernization see the following note.
11
These three works are all included in Dom Justin McCanns modernized edition of The Cloud of
Unknowing (1924). The other four short pieces are in Edmund G.Gardners The Cell of Self-Knowledge
(1910). The Cloud has also been published in modernized versions by Father Henry Collins (1871)
and by Evelyn Underhill (1912).
12
The Scale of Perfection has been edited by Dom Ephrem Guy (1869), J.B.Dalgairns (1870), and
Evelyn Underhill (1923), and in a French translation with valuable notes by Dom Noetinger and Dom
Bouvet (1923). Hiltons Letter to a Devout Man of Secular Estate, a treatise on the mixed life, is
included in the English editions of the Scale above. The only other work of Hiltons that has been
printed is the Song of Angels, included in Gardners Cell of Self-Knowledge, as above.
13
Although an early tradition attributes the Cloud of Unknowing to Hilton, it is inconceivable to
the present writer that he could have written it.
The Cloud
of
Unknowing
Walter
Hilton:
The Scale
of
Perfection
230
Julian of
Norwich
Margery
Kempe
is aloof and self-contained Hilton is solicitous and humble. As he says, a man

that would climb upon a ladder that is high, and setteth his foot upon the lowest
stave, can [not] at the next step get up to the highest, but must go by degrees
from one to another, and so he spends much time on elementary directions for
piety, discussing at length the Deadly Sins, and the need for surmounting them.
Indeed so constantly is he preoccupied with the weaknesses of the flesh and with
matters proper to the preacher rather than the mystic that one is frequently led
to doubt his place among true mystics. Ecstasy for him is a quiet glow, but the
soul is nevertheless detached from worldly concerns and through grace it is
drawn into the privy-chamber, into sight of our Lord Jesus, and heareth his privy
counsel, and is wonderfully comforted in the hearing. Hilton is not a great original
thinker; he has absorbed what suits him from earlier mysticsparticularly Rolle
and the author of the Cloud. He supports his exposition constantly by quotation
from biblical and other authorities and respects learning in its proper place. The
Scale of Perfection is carefully planned and wrought out with painstaking
consideration. Its devotional matter and attention to what may be called the
first steps in spirituality won for it widespread and lasting popularity.
The autobiographical type of mystical treatise is best represented in English
by the record of two women who saw visions and, being themselves simple
and unlettered, had their experiences committed to writing through the good
offices of another. Julian (or Juliana) of Norwich, born about 1342 and still
alive in 1416, was a recluse in a cell attached to the church of St. Julian at
Norwich. In her thirty-first year (1373) she fell desperately ill and for a week
was not expected to live. When the crisis had passed she experienced in rapid
succession sixteen revelations or shewings, mostly of Christs sufferings in
the Crucifixion. Twenty years later she received certain teaching inwardly
by which she came to understand more fully the previous shewings. It is
often difficult to know where revelation ends and subsequent reflection begins,
but her Revelations exist in two forms, a shorter and a fuller version, and it is
supposed that the shorter form records more nearly her original visions.14
Very different in personality was Margery Kempe of Lynn. Until recently
all that was known of her was the little eight-page quarto printed about
1501 by Wynkyn de Worde. But in 1934 a manuscript in the possession of
Colonel William Butler-Bowden was identified by Miss Hope Emily Allen
as a complete copy of Margerys book.15 Margery Kempe was born about
1373, the daughter of a former mayor of Lynn. She was married to John
Kempe, worshipful burgess of Lynn, to whom she bore fourteen children
14
The earlier version was edited by Dundas Harford, Comfortable Words for Christs Lovers
(1911). The most available editions of the fuller Revelations of Divine Love are those of Grace Warrack
(1901) and Dom Roger Hudleston (1927). A French translation by Dom Mennier (Tours, 1900) has a
valuable introduction.
15
The identification was announced in the London Times, Dec. 27, 1934. A modernized version
was published by the owner (1936) and the original text by Sanford B.Meech (1940; EETS, 212) with
preliminary notes and observations by Hope Emily Allen. Miss Allen is at work on a full discussion
and commentary which will appear as Vol. II of this edition. The Book, of Margery Kempe was put
into final shape between 1436 and 1438.
231
before they agreed to a life of continence. For six months after the birth of
her first child she was out of her mind, but one day Christ appeared to her
and spoke to her and her reason was miraculously restored. It was some
time, however, before she abandoned her pride of dress, envy of her neighbors,
and other sinful ways. Gradually she began to see visions and to receive
other evidences of Gods favor.
The spiritual change wrought in her showed itself, after her pilgrimage to
Jerusalem, in frequent and abundant weeping. The sight of the crucifix, a
good sermon, the taking of communion would cause her to break into tears
and utter loud cries, and sometimes writhe on the ground, frequently to the
great annoyance of those present. On Corpus Christi day, as the priests bore
the sacrament about the town in solemn procession, she cried, I die, I die,
and roared so wonderfully, that people wondered upon her. She takes obvious
satisfaction in her wonderful cryings, noting that on one day she had
fourteen. She seems to attach importance to their loudness. She tells us that
on one occasion when receiving the sacrament she cried so loud that it
could be heard all about the church, and outside the church, and she records
with distressing frequency the occasions on which she cried and roared,
and wept full boisterously.
Margery Kempe was no recluse. She traveled to London and Canterbury,
to Norwich, Lincoln, and York, to Rome and Jerusalem, and Compostella,
and, at the age of sixty, to Danzig, Aachen, and other places on the Continent.
Nor was she one to hide her light under a bushel. She confessed her sins from
childhood to several different confessors and shewed her manner of living
to many a worthy clerk, to worshipful doctors of divinity, both religious men
and others of secular habit. She insisted on wearing white, even though it
made her conspicuous, and notes without reticence that on one occasion in a
church at Leicester there was so much people that they stood upon stools
for to behold her.
Of the quiet sense of oneness with God experienced by other mystics
Margery Kempe says little. Instead, she reports at length many conversations
with Christ, and mentions other occasions on which she was spoken to by
the Virgin Mary, St. Peter, St. Paul, St. Katherine, or whatever saint in heaven
she had devotion to. She appears to have been quite susceptible to the power
of suggestion and her experiences often recall those of Rolle, Julian of Norwich,
and other mystics whose writings had been read to her, but for valid
comparisons one must lock to certain women on the Continent, and especially
in Germany, at about the same period. Each reader will form his own opinion
of Margerys neurotic temperament and of the extent to which her
eccentricities and hysterical outbursts were the result of genuine religious
feeling. Certainly her boisterous weeping and sobbing, her roaring and
writhings would not have found favor with the deeply spiritual, albeit
outspoken, author of the Cloud of Unknowing. But as a human document
and for its many glimpses of medieval life the Book of Margery Kempe has
great interest, and as time goes on will reach a widening circle of readers.
XIV
The Alliterative Revival
Alliterative
Verse
Associated
with the
North and
West
In the last few chapterson the romance, the religious omnibus, the lyric,
and the writings of the mysticswe have become increasingly aware of the
intense literary activity that marks the whole fourteenth century, an activity
that reaches its culmination for most readers today in the great narrative
poetry of Chaucer. It is an activity that extends from one end of England to
the other, an activity in which London and the court participate to no
overwhelming extent but rather share along with many other sections of the
country. The widespread distribution of the ferment that was at work is
indicated perhaps nowhere more plainly than in the emergence about 1350
of the Old English alliterative tradition after it had lain hidden for nearly two
hundred years.
Roughly between the years 1350 and 1400 there appeared a score of poems,
ranging from a few hundred lines to several thousand, in a metre which had
clearly evolved in an unbroken development from the old four-beat alliterative
measure of Beowulf and Cynewulf. It is not an antiquarian revival, but the
reappearance of a metrical pattern which has undergone considerable change.
The line has become in most cases the unit of thought, and the alliteration is
therefore not so much structural as decorative. With some poets hunting the
letter becomes a passion, and the alliteration falls on three syllables in a halfline or is carried through several consecutive lines. Verse of this sort was
obviously associated in Chaucers mind with the north, as is indicated by the
well-known words of the Parson:
But trusteth wel, I am a Southern man,
I can not gesterum, ram, rufby lettre.
And most of the poems in the alliterative revival belong to the north and to
the northwest Midlands. While one of the most importantPiers
Plowmanhas its origin in the west Midlands, we may think of the
alliterative revival as occurring in the north and more particularly the
northwest of England.
Three of the earliest poems in the revival, Alexander A, Alexander B, and
William of Palerne, have already been discussed in the chapters on the
romance. There we have likewise treated other later romances in alliterative
verse, such as The Wars of Alexander, The Destruction of Troy, the Morte
Arthure, and the religious romance The Destruction of Jerusalem. It is not
practicable to include them again here, where as part of the alliterative
232
THE ALLITERATIVE REVIVAL
233
movement they would be fully entitled to a place.1 We shall have to be content

with this brief reference, and confine ourselves in this and the following chapter
to the other classes of alliterative poetry. In the present chapter we shall treat
the works of the Pearl poet and one or two poems in some ways related to
his. In the chapter which follows we shall consider a group of poems concerned
with social and ethical questions, of which the most important is the great
social document Piers Plowman.
Of the many unique manuscripts gathered together in the seventeenth
century by the famous antiquary Sir Robert Cotton, among which are the
Beowulf codex, the two texts of Layamons Brut, the Ludus Coventriae, and
others only less famous, one is a modest quarto volume known as Nero A x.2
The contents consist of four alliterative poems in a hand of the end of the
fourteenth century. Accompanying the text are twelve illustrations of quite
crude workmanship depicting episodes in some of the poems. None of the
texts is accompanied by any title, but they have been named, in the order of
their occurrence in the manuscript, the Pearl, Purity (or Cleanness), Patience,
and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
The Pearl3 is not only first in the manuscript but shares with the Gawain
the first place in the interest of modern readers. In a hundred stanzas of
twelve lines each,4 ingeniously linked in groups of five by repetition and a
refrain, the poet tells how a lovely pearl, smooth and white, slipped from his
hands into the grass and was lost in the ground. In his grief he often visits the
spot which covers his pearl, and one August day, lulled by the fragrance of
herbs and flowers, he falls asleep on the little mound. There as he slumbers
he dreams that he is in another world, a world of crystal cliffs, bright woods,
and strands pebbled with precious stones. Such sights make him forget his
grief, and he wanders about in sheer delight. Finally he comes upon a stream,
clear and sparkling, beyond which he thinks must be Paradise. It is backed by
a crystal cliff, at the foot of which sits a child
A gracious maiden full debonaire;
Glistening white was her robe:
I knew her well; I had seen her before.
The longer he looks at her the better he knows her. He has an impulse to call
her, but seeing her in so strange a place deters him. She is spotless, and her dress
is trimmed profusely with pearls. She wears a crown, from beneath which her
hair falls loosely on her shoulders. No tongue could fittingly describe the sight:
1
See above, pp. 182 ff. On the later alliterative movement in Scotland see Sir William Craigie,
The Scottish Alliterative Poems, Proc. Brit. Acad., XXVIII (1942). 217236.
2
It is reproduced in facsimile in EETS, 162.
3
Edited by Richard Morris (2ed., 1869; EETS, I), Sir Israel Gollancz (1891; 1921), and Charles
G.Osgood (1906; Belles-Lettres Ser.). A translation is included in Gollanczs edition, and there are
modern renderings by G.G.Coulton (1907), Osgood (1907). Sophie Jewett (1908), and Stanley P.Chase
(1932).
4
The rime scheme is abababab bcbc. There are 101 stanzas, but one is considered spurious or was
canceled by the author.
The Pearl
Poet
Pearl
234
So clean was it and clear and pure,

That precious pearl where it was set.
Thus arrayed she comes down to the brink. She was nearer to me, he says,
than aunt or niece. Finally she speaks to him and he then addresses her:
O Pearl, quoth I, in pearls bedight,
Art thou my pearl that I have plaina,
Regretted when all alone at night?
Much longing for thee have I restrained
Since into the grass thou didst from me glide.
The
Allegory
Grown in stature and in wisdom, she reveals to him her life as spouse of the
Heavenly Bridegroom. The dreamers pearl was not lost when it was put in a
coffer so comely as is this gracious garden. Along with thousands of others
she shares a most happy lot. When the poet objects that she did nothing to
deserve so great a reward, since she lived not two years in our land and
knew neither her Paternoster nor Creed, she enters upon an elaborate discourse
on the part played by merit and grace in salvation and the equality of the
saved before God,5 illustrating her views at length by biblical parables. The
poet is finally granted a view of her abodethe New Jerusalemvividly
adapted from the Apocalypse. His effort in trying to cross the stream and
reach the heavenly city wakens him from his dream, and he rises from the
mound on which he had slumbered, filled with a new spiritual strength.
This beautiful and seemingly transparent allegory has been interpreted in
various ways and has led to considerable controversy. The traditional view
sees in the poem an elegy in which the poet grieves for the death of a twoyear-old daughter and is consoled by her in a vision of a common medieval
type. This view was challenged by Schofield in 1904, who denied the
autobiographical interpretation and suggested that the poet was merely
upholding the virtue of purity under the symbolism of a pearl, with appropriate
personification.6 While his view has not found much favor7 his example has
led others to attempt new explanations and various modifications of the
original interpretation. The Pearl has been taken as symbolizing the
Eucharist8 and more recently as recording a state of spiritual dryness
experienced by the poet and not unknown to religious and to mystics.9 Still
5
The orthodoxy of the poets views was questioned by Carleton F.Brown, The Author of The
Pearl Considered in the Light of His Theological Opinions, PMLA, XIX (1904). 115153, and defended
by James Sledd, MLN, LV (1940). 381. While his attitude toward grace has been shown to be good
doctrine, equality of reward appears to be stressed beyond medieval orthodoxy.
6
W.H.Schofield, The Nature and Fabric of The Pearl, PMLA, XIX (1904). 154215; Symbolism,
Allegory, and Autobiography in The Pearl, PMLA, XXIV (1909). 585675.
7
Schofields interpretation was opposed by Osgood (ed. cit.) and his objections to an
autobiographical interpretation were disposed of by Coulton in MLR, II (1907). 3943.
8
R.M.Garrett, The PearlAn Interpretation (Seattle, 1918; Univ. of Wash. Pub. in English, Vol.
IV, No. I).
9
Sister M.Madeleva, Pearl: A Study in Spiritual Dryness (1925).
235
others have sought to reconcile the elegiacal and symbolical interpretations.10

There is symbolism, to be sure, in incidental ways in the poem, and the
problems of divine grace and the equality of heavenly rewards constitute the
major theme for discussion, but there are too many features which are
meaningless on any other assumption than that the poet mourns the loss of a
real child.11 The poem treats certain aspects of salvation in the framework of
a personal elegy, employing the medieval conventions of vision and debate.
Viewed as a personal elegy the Pearl is a poem of deep feeling, the poets
grief yielding gradually to resignation and spiritual reconciliation. In its
sensuous beauty, its artistic restraint, its skilful manipulation of a complex
and difficult metrical pattern, and its imaginatively beautiful descriptions of
the garden, the pearl-maiden, and the New Jerusalem, it is in its best parts
unsurpassed by anything in Middle English poetry.
In two respects Purity,12 the second poem in the manuscript, resembles the
Pearlin its preoccupation with an ethical question and in its predilection
for extended paraphrases of biblical incident. For here we have a discourse
on purity, showing how impossible it is for one who is unclean to approach
Gods pure presence, and enforcing the point by the parable of the man without
a wedding garment. This and other episodes such as the Fall of Lucifer and
the Expulsion from Paradise are merely preliminary, however, to the main
purpose, which is to tell the stories of the Flood, the Destruction of Sodom
and Gomorrah, and the profanation of the holy vessels in Belshazzars Feast.
The homiletic purpose is plain, and at the end the poet not only reminds us
that upon rynne wyses he has showed the sorrow that uncleanness causes
our Lord but he closes with a prayer for grace. The stories are vividly told,
but the poem suffers by comparison with the Pearl through the lack of any
framework or artistic motivation.
This is also true of its companion piece, Patience,13 which devotes all
but the first sixty of its 531 lines to the story of Jonah and the whale. But
concentration upon a single subject gives greater unity to the piece, and
the poet has allowed his imagination freer rein in embellishing his theme.
He shows us the activity in getting under sail, describes vividly the storm
at sea, pictures with realistic detail the slimy insides of the whale, and
reports dramatically Jonahs conversations with God. Gods rebuke of
Jonah for his impatience leads the poet to his closing reflection. He who
is too hasty in tearing his clothes will often sit sewing them up. Even
poverty must be borne with patience, which is a noble point, though it displease
10
Jefferson B.Fletcher, The Allegory of the Pearl, JEGP, XX (1921). 121, and Ren Wellek,
The Pearl: An Interpretation of the Middle-English Poem, Studies in English (Charles Univ., Prague),
IV (1933). 133. Both these papers stress the complex character of the symbolism.
11
For an attempt to identify the child see Oscar Cargill and Margaret Schlauch, The Pearl and Its
Jeweler, PMLA, XLIII (1928). 105123.
12
Edited by Richard Morris (2ed., 1869; EETS, I), Robert J.Menner (1920; Yale Stud, in English,
61), and Sir Israel Gollancz (1921).
13
Edited by Richard Morris (as above), Hartley Bateson (Manchester, 1912; 2ed., 1918), and
Israel Gollancz (1913).
A Personal
Elegy
Purity
Patience
236
oft. In both Purity and Patience the poets principal indebtedness is to the
Bible, and the Pearl not only draws its parables from the same source but
derives its description of the New Jerusalem from the Apocalypse. Other
sources in Tertullian, an eclogue of Boccaccio, and even the Book of the
Knight of La Tour Landry have been suggested but with the possible exception
of Boccaccios eclogue, must be described as very doubtful. The poet refers
once to Jean de Meun and his part of the Roman de la Rose, and he has
drawn scattered details in Purity from Mandevilles Travels in their French
form. But while the author of these poems was apparently well read, we have
not been very successful in tracking down the sources of his inspiration outside
of the Scriptures.
There seems to be no reason to doubt that the three poems the Pearl, Purity,
and Patience are the work of one man. The fourth poem in the manuscript is
of such a different kind that if it were not found in association with the others
Sir Gawain we might well hesitate to attribute it to the same authorship, in spite of obvious
and the
stylistic resemblances.14 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight15 is a courtly romance,
Green
the finest Arthurian romance in English. Though it exemplifies the knightly
Knight
virtues of courage and truth, it is in no sense a story told to enforce a moral. It
is quite in the spirit of French romance, told for its own sake.
The plot itself is so well known as to need no retelling. The main adventure
Subject
Matter and is the challenge, which Gawain accepts, of an exchange of blows with the
Treatment Green Knight, in which he beheads the challenger but must submit to the
same hazard a year later. With this is combined the adventure at Bercilaks
castle, in which Gawain is tempted on three successive mornings by his
hosts wife and in which his only fault is in concealing the magic girdle
which she gives him. Both of these stories are found separately either in
Celtic or in Old French romances.16 They are first found combined in the
English poem,17 and whether we owe the combination to the English poet
14
Apart from the stylistic features common to all four poems, there are noteworthy parallels between
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Purity. It should be remembered, however, that the romance
also shows many striking parallels in phrases and lines with the Wars of Alexander.
15
There are older editions by Sir Frederic Madden for the Bannatyne Club (1839) and Richard
Morris (1864; EETS, 4); revised by I.Gollancz (1897 and 1912), but the romance is best studied in the
edition of J.R.R.Tolkien and E.V.Gordon (1925) or the new edition of Sir Israel Gollancz with
introductory essays by Mabel Day and Mary S.Serjeantson (1940; EETS, 210). Modern renderings by
Jessie L.Weston (1898), often reprinted, T.H.Banks (1929), G.H.Gerould (1934), etc. are available
separately or in anthologies.
16
The fullest study of the sources of the romance is George L.Kittredge, A Study of Gawain and
the Green Knight (Cambridge, Mass., 1916). The challenge or beheading game is found in an episode
known as The Champions Bargain which closes the Irish romance (at least as old as the eleventh
century) of Fled Bricrend, or Bricrius Feast. From there it passed into French, where it was embodied
independently into four separate romances (the Livre de Caradoc, incorporated in the first continuation
of Chrtiens Perceval, the short thirteenth-century romance La Mule sanz Frain, the prose Grail romance
known as the Perlesvaus in which the adventure is attributed to Lancelot, and another thirteenthcentury romance entitled Gawain et Humbaut in which the ending has been completely changed).
Parallels to the temptation motif are not so close, but in one form or another it is found in the Old
French Ider, in the late English Carl of Carlisle, and elsewhere.
17
There are many theories accounting for the combination. Kittredge believed that Sir
Gawain and the Green Knight was based on a lost French romance in which the adventures
237
or to his source we must grant that it was a happy inspiration which tied the
three temptations to the three blows offered Gawain at the Green Chapel
and made the wound received from the third blow the result of his concealing
the girdle. Accepting the supernatural as a prerogative of medieval story, we
have a skilfully contrived plot,18 a feature always worthy of remark in medieval
romance. But it is only one, and that perhaps the least, of the qualities which
give this remarkable poem its high place among English romances. From the
beginning almost to the end it proceeds by a succession of scenes and situations
full of color and movement and vivid detail. We begin with the New Years
feast, the guests exchanging greetings and gifts, the maidens laughing and
making mirth till it is time to eat, then washing and seating themselves at
tables. Just as the music ceases and the first course has been served the Green
Knight enters. He is fully describedstature, appearance, dress, armor, horse,
trappingsas he rides straight up to the das. And so it goes from episode to
episode like a succession of tapestries or medieval illuminations. The
descriptions of the seasons as they mark the passing of the year and bring
Gawain to the time when he must set out to keep his pledge are no mere
literary exercises, and the hunting scenes have all the excitement and
lifelikeness of first-hand experience or observation. Striking, too, is the poets
mastery of dialogue, always easy and natural, but particularly skilful in the
extended conversations between Gawain and the lady of the castle, as she
seeks an opening and he adroitly evades and parries each thrust. Finally, one
should remark the dexterous way in which the poet keeps the various actions
moving forward simultaneously, passing from the dalliance of the lady to the
husbands adventures in the chase and back again to the bed chamber until
all parties are brought together naturally at the end of each day. But there is
no end of things to exclaim over and we can only hint at the enjoyment to be
had from reading and rereading this fine romance.19
were combined. J.R.Hulbert, Syr Gawayn and the Grene Knyzt, MP, XIII (191516). 433462,
689730, believes they were originally joined in a Fairy Mistress story as the conditions which the
hero must fulfill. Else von Schaubert, Der englische Ursprung von Syr Gawayn and the Grene Knyzt,
ESt, LVII (1923). 330446, maintains that they were first combined by the English poet. This is also
the view of Miss Day in the essay noted above. O.Lhmann, Die Sage von Gawain und dem grnen
Ritter (Knigsberg, 1938), likewise believes in the English origin of the romance, but argues that a
Fairy Mistress story has been changed into a test of the hero.
18
The idea that Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is connected in some way with the Order of the
Garter is most fully advocated in Isaac Jackson, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight considered as a
Garter Poem, Anglia, XXXVII (1913). 393423, and opposed by J.R.Hulbert in the article already
referred to (MP. XIII, especially pp. 710 ff.).
19
In the absence of any objective evidence for determining the order of composition it has seemed
best to treat the poems in the order in which they occur in the manuscript. Patience and Purity probably
belong together, and since Purity has a number of parallels with the Gawain, it probably stands closer
to the latter. On artistic grounds the Pearl and Gawain should follow the homiletic pieces, though this
is not a safe criterion for pieces unlike in kind. One could argue for an order which would put the
Gawain first, followed by the Pearl, the be-reavement in which led the poet to the moral concerns of
Purity and Patience. Such an order would have the advantage of putting Patience after Purity, to
which it is superior in structure and unity.
238
The
Author
St.
Erkenwald
Pistel of
Swete
Susan
All that we know about the author of these four poems is what can be
cautiously inferred from his work, and all attempts to identify him with
Huchown, Strode, or any other individual have failed. The dialect of the
manuscript, which there is no reason to think differs essentially from that of
the author, would indicate that he belonged to the northwest Midlands,
probably south Lancashire, and this general locality is supported by the
landscape and local allusions in the poems. He need not have been a priest in
spite of his preoccupation with theological and moral questions, though a
position as chaplain in some noblemans household would make such an
interest natural and account for his familiarity with the ways of courtly life.
Naturally, however, such knowledge could be otherwise accounted for. His
vocabulary contains a large French element which might result from his social
status or his acquaintance with French literature. This was certainly
considerable. He impresses us as a man of cosmopolitan taste whose horizon
was not bounded by the limits of a provincial neighborhood. That he was at
once observant and imaginative is apparent. His literary activity coincides
roughly with the earlier part of Chaucers career, and in the absence of more
precise information we cannot do better than to date his work c. 1375.
Various other alliterative poems have from time to time been attributed to
the Pearl poet. Among them the one that has found most supporters is St.
Erkenwald 20 which attributes to the Old English bishop of this name a miracle
not otherwise recorded. When St. Pauls in London was being rebuilt a tomb
was uncovered in which was the body of a pagan judge. Since he had always
been just in his awards, his body and clothing were still as fresh as at the time
of his death. At Erkenwalds bidding the corpse reveals its identity, whereupon
the bishops tears fall on the body, constituting baptism and releasing the
soul. Bodily decay at once sets in. The story is told in 352 clear and
straightforward verses, but the present writer at least cannot accept the
attribution to the Pearl poet.
Associated with the poems previously discussed is a short piece of twentyeight tail-rime stanzas, each with thirteen alliterative lines, called the Pistel
of Swete Susan.21 It tells the story of Susanna and the Elders from the
thirteenth chapter of Daniel (in the Vulgate), with the description of the
garden embellished with details drawn from the Roman de la Rose. It is
told simply and effectively, at times with the deft touches of an artist. When
Susanna, allowed to speak to her husband, has avowed her innocence and
fidelity to him,
ei toke e feteres of hire feete,
And evere he kyssed at swete:
In other world schal we mete.
Seide he no mare, (lines 25760)
20
Edited by Horstmann, Altenglische Legenden (1881), Gollancz (1922), and Henry L. Savage
(1926; Yale Stud, in English, 72).
21
Edited by Hans Kster, Huchowns Pistel of Swete Susan (Strassburg, 1895; Quellen und
Forschungen, LXXVI).
239
A passage in Wyntouns Orygynale Cronykil (c. 1420) asserts that the author
was Huchown of the Awle Ryale (Royal Court), who is there credited also
with the Gret Gest off Arthure and the Awyntyre off Gawane.22 The
attribution cannot be accepted, but the passage has led some to believe that
Huchown was not only the Pearl poet but the author of most of the poems in
the alliterative revival.23 Naturally such extravagant claims have not met
with much favor. While the six poems discussed in the present chapter are
linked together by certain features of subject matter and treatment it seems
best to hold to the conservative view which limits the work of the Pearl poet
to the poems preserved in the famous Cotton manuscript.
22
He made the Gret Gest off Arthure

And the Awyntyre off Gawane
The Pystyll als off Swete Swsane.
The Gret Gest off Arthure is believed to be the alliterative Morte Arthure, presumably in its fuller
form (see ch. X, above). The Awyntyre off Gawane is identified by those who believe Huchown to be
the Pearl poet with Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, by others with the Awntyrs of Arthur (see p.
190, note 22).
23
George Neilson, Huchown of the Awle Ryale, the Alliterative Poet (Glasgow, 1902), who argues
that Huchown is to be identified with the gude Sir Hew of Eglintoun mentioned by Dunbar in his
Lament for the Makaris. In spite of the extravagance of his thesis Neilsons book contains much
interesting matter.
XV
Piers Plowman and Other Alliterative Poems
Poems of
Social
Protest
Wynnere
and
Wastoure
It is a noteworthy feature of the alliterative revival in the second half of the

fourteenth century that a number of poems in the older measure, and among
them some of the most important, are poems of social and moral protest.1 This
should not cause surprise when we remember that the period was ushered in
by the Black Death with its grave economic and political consequences, that it
saw the Peasants Revolt in 1381, and that Wyclif and the Lollard movement
are only another manifestation of the general up-heaval which unsettled so
many established conditions and beliefs. Nor should it seem altogether strange
that much of this social criticism should appear in alliterative verse rather than
in the more conventional measure of the court. The criticism is directed at the
government which tolerated so many abuses, and like most forms of political
opposition came from those outside the group in power. The poems which we
shall consider in the present chapter all express the point of view of the common
man. They are like voices crying in the wilderness, denouncing evils without
seeming so much as to hope for their redress.
The earliest, apparently, is Wynnere and Wastoure,2 dating from about
1352. Allusions in the prologue indicate that it is by a western man and
in all probability a professional minstrel of the old school, since he complains
that the minstrels calling is not what it once was but is filled with beardless
youths who jangle als a jaye and japes telle. In some five hundred lines
the poem presents a dispute between thrift (Winner), representing the
merchants, lawyers, the Pope, the four orders of friars 3all men of
propertyand waste represented by a gay young spendthrift who neglects
his lands and dovecotes, sells his holdings, and squanders his money on
revelry and proud clothes for himself and his wife. In the third and
1
Social complaint is not unknown to English verse before the period of which we speak, but it is for
the most part brief and sporadic. When Holy Church Is under Foot has been mentioned above (see p.
123). Two poems in MS Harl. 2253 offer respectively A Satire on the Consistory Courts and a Song of
the Husbandman, the latter a husbandmans complaint that he is taxed and fleeced until he has nothing
left. A poem in the Auchinleck MS on The Evil Times of Edward II (476 lines) parallels more closely
some of the poems discussed in the present chapter, at least in the abuses which it describes. The late
fourteenth-century Sir Penny treats a thememoney can do anythingfound also in Latin and French.
Most of these poems are printed in Thomas Wrights Political Songs of England (1839; Camden Soc.).
2
Edited by Sir Israel Gollancz (1920, 1931), and previously for the Roxburghe Club (1897). For
further evidence bearing on the date see J.R.Hulbert, The Problems of Authorship and Date of Wynnere
and Wastoure, MP, XVIII (1920). 3140; J.M.Steadman, Jr., The Date of Winnere and Wastoure,
MP, XIX (1921). 211219; Gardiner Still well, Wynnere and Wastoure and the Hundred Years War,
ELH, VIII (1941). 241247.
3
The meaning of the two hosts and their constituents is not very clear.
240
PIERS PLOWMAN AND OTHER ALLITERATIVE POEMS
241
presumably last fitt the King (Edward III) gives the disputants the surprising
advice to go each his own wayWinner to the Pope at Rome, Waster to
Cheapsideeach to live in a land where he is loved most. The conclusion
of the poem is missing, so that the final attitude of the author is unknown,
but he seems to be trying to please both sides and therefore presents his ideas
in the familiar debate form.
Less unified is the Parlement of the Thre Ages.4 Not capable of being
exactly dated, it has been associated on rather slight grounds with Wynnere
and Wastoure and attributed to the same author. This at least is quite doubtful.5
The Parlement in general plan reminds us of Purity and Patience: the poet
puts forward a proposition which offers the excuse for a long narrative
illustration. In this case, after a prologue of 103 lines telling how he shot,
dressed, and concealed a hart (i.e., he was poaching 6), he falls asleep. In his
dream he sees three menYouth, aged thirty, gaily dressed in green; Middle
Age, sixty years old, in sober gray; and Old Age, in black, described as a
decrepit old man of a hundred, mumbling his Creed. In the parlement (talk,
discussion) which follows each explains his philosophy of life. The young
man speaks of his leman, of dancing, chess, hawking by the river. Middle Age
deprecates Youths expensive clothes, the price of which would purchase lands.
Old Age assures them they are both foolish. He was once just like them. Now
death has stolen upon him, as it has on many another great and proud. This
gives the poet his opportunity to relate the experience of some of these, and
in the remainder of the poem, more than half of its 665 lines, he gives accounts
of each of the Nine Worthies, next of the wights that were wisestAristotle,
Virgil, Solomon, and Merlinand finally of the proudest in press that
paramours lovedAmadas and Ydoine, Samson and Delilah, Tristan and
Iseult, and others. All these prove that nothing avails against death; and Old
Age, urging his companions to confess their sins, goes off with the words,
Death dings on my door; I dare no longer abide. The theme is naturally
perennial and such social criticism as occurs in the poem is purely incidental.
The greatest of all the alliterative poems of social protest is Piers
Plowman, or more properly The Vision of William concerning Piers the
Plowman. Even this longer title is inadequate to describe the poem in its
fullest form, for it has come down to us in three very different states.7 The
earliest or A-text is rather short (2579 lines) and consists of a prologue and eleven
4
Edited by Israel Gollancz (1915) and earlier for the Roxburghe Club (1897).
Gollanczs theory of common authorship is opposed by Hulbert (MP, XVIII. 3134) and Steadman
(MP, XXI. 713).
6
See H.L.Savage, Notes on the Prologue of the Parlement of the Thre Ages (JEGP, XXIX (1930).
7482), who here and elsewhere has shown how exact was the poets knowledge of deer hunting and
outdoor life.
7
The three versions were edited separately by W.W.Skeat for the EETS (186784; texts in Vols. 28,
38, 54, notes and glossary in Vols. 67, 81) and later en regard (2V, Oxford, 1886). No one should ever
belittle the work of Skeat, who through his tireless labors as an editor did an incalculable service to
Middle English scholarship. Nevertheless, more critical editions of all three texts are badly needed,
and are in preparation.
5
Parlement
cf the
Thre Ages
Piers
Plowman
242
Three
Texts
The First
Vision
Second
Vision
cantos or passus.8 The second or B-text is a revision of the first and a

continuation amounting to the prologue and twenty passus (7241 lines). The
third or C-text represents a further revision, sometimes slight but sometimes
considerable. It is of about the same length as the B-text (it is 7353 lines 9)
but is divided into twenty-three passus. Such repeated revisions of the poem
are evidence of its continued popularity, a popularity which is confirmed by
the existence today of more than fifty manuscripts. It is therefore worth while
to consider in some detail the contents of this remarkable work.
In its earliest form the poem consists of three successive visions, two of
them intimately connected, the third rather incoherent. As the poem opens,
the author clad as a hermit is wandering one May morning on the Malvern
hills, falls asleep on the bank of a brook, and dreams a marvelous dream. In
a wilderness, he knows not where, but doubtless the neighborhood in which
he has been wandering, he sees off to the east a tower on a high hill, down in
the valley below a dungeon, and in between a field full of folksome
plowing, some wearing fine clothes, business men, beggars, pilgrims, hermits,
friars of the four orders preaching and often covetous, parish priests hurrying
to London, lawyers, bishops, and tradesmen of all kinds. Soon a lady named
Holy Church comes down from the cliff and chides the dreamer for sleeping.
Doesnt he see all these people so busy in their various ways? Somewhat
afraid, he asks her to explain what the scene before him means. She tells him
that Truth, who is God, dwells in the tower and that the Father of Falseness
(the Devil) inhabits the dungeon. He asks her to teach him how to save his
soul. Truth is best, she says, and charity, and especially love of the poor. But
he wishes to know more, how he can recognize and thus avoid Falseness. She
bids him look on his left. There he sees a woman, richly clad in a scarlet robe
and many jewels, the equal of a queen. She is Lady Meed, the symbol both of
just reward and of bribery, more often the latter. She is about to be married
to False, with the assistance of Guile, Simony, Liar, and other evil characters,
until Theology protests. The King thereupon proposes to marry her to
Conscience, but Conscience refuses, pointing out many evil practices which
Lady Meed is responsible for. Unable to reconcile the two, for bribery and
conscience are naturally irreconcilable, the King appeals to Reason, who
consents to serve the King if Conscience will be their counselor. At this point
the dreamer awakes and the first Vision ends.
But before he has walked a furlong drowsiness overtakes him and he
again dreams. In his second vision, the vision of the Seven Deadly Sins
and the search for Truth, he is back with his field full of folk, to whom
Conscience is about to preach a sermon. Conscience alludes to the recent
pestilences and the destructive wind of Saturday [January 15, 1362],
evidences of Gods anger at the sins of the people. He calls upon sundry classes
and individuals to repentwasters, Pernel the Courtesan, priests, prelates, etc.
8
9
A portion of a twelfth passus with a conclusion by John But is found in one MS.
These figures are based upon Skeats texts. Manly gives B as 7242 and C as 7357 (CHEL, II. 3).
243
His words have the effect of making the various sinners confess their evil
ways, repent, and even set out to seek St. Truth. A Palmer whom they meet
and whose life has been spent visiting holy places seems a natural person to
direct them in their quest. But he fails them miserably, admitting that he
never knew a palmer to seek such a saint! It is at this point that a simple
plowman named Peter puts forth his head and says he knows the saint very
well. Common sense and a clean conscience have acquainted him with St.
Truth and he has served him for the last fifteen years. No man is better pay.
The way to his court is through Meekness to Conscience and thus on through
the Ten Commandments. Grace is warden of the gate. If Grace permits them
to enter, they shall see Truth himself in their hearts.
This is another way of saying that to attain to God man must do well,
must lead a worthy life. But what does the poet consider a worthy life? A
concrete instance makes it fairly clear: Piers tells the company that before
he can go with them and show them the way to Truth he has a half-acre to
plow. It is an interesting picture. Some help him to plow, but others sit and
drink or pretend to be sick and wont work until Hunger compels them.
The whole episode suggests that man should do the task that falls to his lot.
The names of Piers wife and children imply further that the ordinary man
at least, besides working in season, should keep out of mischief and mind
his own business.
In the eighth passus Truth gives Piers a pardon which is found to contain
only two lines
Et qui bona egerunt, ibunt in vitam eternam;
Qui vero mala, in ignem eternam.
A priest sniffs at such a pardon, but as the dreamer wakes and reflects on his
dream he is convinced that Do-well is worth more at Doomsday than all the
pardons of St. Peters church. The passus concludes with the words Explicit
hic Visio Wilhelmi de Petro de Plowzman. Eciam incipit Vita de Do-well,
Do-bet, et Do-best secundum wyt et resoun.
The ninth passus accordingly marks a new departure in the poem. The
poet, taking up Piers quest, roams about a whole summer in search of
Do-well. Two Franciscan friars tell him that Do-well dwells with them,
but he disputes their claim and continues his search. As he rests beside a
wood, he again falls asleep and dreams. He soon meets Thought, who is
described as a large man like himself. Thought explains that Do-well is
when a man is mild of speech, true of tongue, and fair in his dealings.
Dobet, besides practising these virtues, gives to the poor. Do-best bears a
bishops cross. For further information they go to Wit, whose wife is Dame
Study, and who sends Piers to her cousin Clergy (learning) and his wife
Scripture (book-knowledge). There is much rambling observation and
moralizing in these episodes, so that when the dreamer says he is none the
nearer for all his walking to knowing what Do-well is, we can only agree
Third
Vision
244
Continuation in the
B-text
Date
with him. As the text breaks off he has asked Scripture to direct him to Kind
Wit (Common Sense).
It is impossible to continue our analysis of the poem as it proceeds in the
B-text, partly because the larger plan, the quest of Do-well, Do-bet, and Dobest, is vague and at times completely obscured, partly because the constant
digressions, parenthetical discussions, and breaks in continuity show that the
author was powerless to resist the impulse to pursue any idea suggested by
another idea or even by a word that he happens to use. Mention of the cardinal
virtues leads him into a digression on cardinals from Rome. He simply cannot
make his thought hew to the line. As a result this part of the poem consists of
many dialogues and discourses on truth, poverty, learning, charity, and the
like, exemplified in the conduct of figures like Faith and Hope contrasted
with Samaritan, or in the friar Flattery, or Haukyn the Active Man. There are
some memorable scenes such as the dinner at which a friar, a doctor on the
high das, ate his food and drank wine with gluttonous delight, while not
four days past he had preached before the Dean of St. Pauls on hunger endured
as a penance. There are narratives of the Annunciation, episodes in the life of
Christ, visions of the Resurrection and the Harrowing of Hell, which are
vigorously related, and there is many a vivid flash of satirical observation
which dies away before we have quite discerned what it was meant to
illuminate. Read for the individual visions and scenes the poem is genuinely
absorbing, but it is the despair of anyone who seeks in it a completely orderly
plan or logical development from episode to episode.
When and by whom was this long and intensely earnest poem written?
Neither of these questions is easily answered, but a number of topical allusions
in the three texts offer a basis for inference concerning the date. The A-text
makes reference to a Southwestern wind on a Saturday at even (v. 14)
which has long been recognized as an allusion to a severe windstorm mentioned
in the chronicles as occurring on Saturday, Jan. 15, 1362. This and other
allusions to events of the year or two previous have led to a fairly general
acceptance of 1362 as the date of the first version. Some allusions can be
interpreted, however, as referring to events in the later sixties10 and the
composition of the poem may have extended over several years. The Btext likewise presents somewhat conflicting evidence, but a date not long
after 1377 seems best to fit the facts. The revision may likewise have
extended over a considerable time.11 The C-text has usually been dated 1393,
10
Oscar Cargill, The Date of the A-text of Piers Ploughman, PMLA, XLVII (1932). 354362,
argues for 1376, which seems too late; Bernard F.Hupp, Piers Plowman and the Norman Wars,
PMLA, LIV (1939). 3764, suggests 137076, probably after 1373; J.A.W. Bennett, The Date of the
A-text of Piers Plowman, PMLA, LVIII (1943). 566572, while dissenting from some of the views
expressed in these articles, argues that certain lines in Passus IV must have been written after October,
1367, and before September, 1370.
11
Bernard F.Hupp, The Date of the B-text of Piers Plowman, SP, XXXVIII (1941). 3344,
argues from a passage in Passus XIX that the poem was not completed until after the autumn of 1378.
On the other hand. Miss Mildred E.Marcetts strong case for identifying the doctour on the heigh
dese with the friar William Jordan (Uhtred de Boldon. Friar William Jordan, and Piers Plowman,
1938) suggests a date around 1370 or even slightly earlier for this episode, and Father A.Gwynn,
245
as Skeat thought, or 1398, as Jusserand argued. But it has been shown that a
date not later than 1387 is suggested by a number of considerations,12 and
we may tentatively accept this year as the terminus ad quem for the final
form of the poem.
One of the most remarkable things about this series of poems is the mystery
that surrounds their authorship. We are accustomed to anonymity in works
of medieval literature, especially in the romance, where stories were told and
retold, and in religious poems where personal reputation was not the authors
main object. It is also true that practically all the poems that make up the
alliterative revival are by poets whose names we do not know. Nevertheless
it is surprising that in Piers Plowman, the three texts of which contain so
many seemingly personal revelations, the poet has so completely concealed
his identity. For all the poems popularity, no contemporary reference to the
author has come down to us. Even the John But who wrote a conclusion to
the A-text that is preserved in one manuscript seems not to have known the
name of its author, and his statement that When this work was wrought.
Death dealt him a dint may be only an inference from the poems unfinished
appearance. Two fifteenth-century notes in manuscripts of the poem13 are
the sole clue to the authors name, and on the strength of their testimony
Piers Plowman has generally been attributed to William Langland.
On the basis of these notes and of allusions scattered through the three
texts of the poem a hypothetical biography would run somewhat as follows,
Born about 1332 at Ledbury in Shropshire, the son (possibly illegitimate)
of Eustace de la Rokayle, the author was sent to school, perhaps at the
priory of Great Malvern, by his father and his friends, and took minor
orders. At the age of about thirty he began the first version of Piers Plowman.
In the course of the work he moved to London, where he lived in Cornhill
with his wife Kitte and his daughter Calote, a kind of clerical vagabond
earning his bread by means of the Paternoster, Placebo, Dirige, the Psalter,
and the Seven Penitential Psalms, which he sang for the souls of those who
contributed to his support. In the B-text he mentions his age as forty-five. The
The Date of the B-text of Piers Plowman, RES, XIX (1943). 124, has gathered other evidence for
a date c. 137072 for Passus XIII-XX, while recognizing that the revision of Passus I-VIII must have
occurred as late as 13767. J.A.W.Bennett, The Date of the B-text of Piers Plowman, MA, XII (1943).
5564, interprets certain passages as evidence that work on parts of the B-text was going on as late as
1377 and possibly in 1379 or even later. Work on the B-text extending over ten years need cause no
great surprise.
12
Sister Mary Aquinas Devlin, The Date of the C Version of Piers the Plowman, [Univ. of Chicago]
Abstracts of Theses, Humanistic Ser., IV (1928). 317320.
13
Ashburnham MS 130, now in the Huntington Library, says simply Robert or William langland
made pers ploughman. The other, Trin, Coll. Dublin MS D. 4. I, makes an important additional
assertion: Memorandum quod Stacy de Rokayle pater Willielmi de Langlond, qui Stacius fuit generosus,
et morabatur in Schypton vnder Whicwode, tenens domini le Spenser in comitatu Oxon, qui predictus
Willielmus fecit librum qui vocatur Perys ploughman. In 1559 John Bale in his Scriptorum Illustrium
Maioris Britanniae Catalogus stated that Langland was born at Cleobury Mortymer in Shropshire. It
has been plausibly suggested that this is a scribal error for Ledbury, in which case Langlands birthplace
would be the same as that of John Masefield. See Allan H.Bright, New Light on Piers Plowman
(Oxford, 1928).
Authorship
Hypothetical
Biography
246
C-text would thus belong toward the end of his life. Most of the allusions on
which this inferential biography is based are found only in the C-text.
Single or
It is obvious that the picture here sketched assumes that all three versions
Multiple
of Piers Plowman are the work of one man. This assumption was questioned
Authorship as long ago as 1856, and in 1906 John M.Manly 14 brought the issue clearly to
the fore in an article which not only argued that the three texts were by different
poets but that the A-text itself was not a unit. The prologue and first eight
passus, he maintained, were by one man and the remainder of the A-text by
another, to which John But added a conclusion. According to this hypothesis
five different authors had a hand in the poems which go by the name of Piers
Plowman. Manlys opinion was based upon what he felt to be differences in
language, differences in versification, differences in the use and in the kind of
figurative language, and above all by such striking differences in the mental
powers and qualities of the authors as make it highly improbable that they
can be one and the same person. He further supported his view by the famous
theory of a lost leaf. 15 Manlys theory was at once attacked by Jusserand
and others, and the controversy over single or multiple authorship has not yet
ended. We cannot follow the course of this controversy here.16 But however
opinion may vary as to the justice of Manlys contention, it cannot be denied
that it has enormously stimulated the study of the poem and led to a much
better understanding of it. It is hazardous to attempt a statement of present
scholarly opinion since it is still strongly divided.17 It may be said, however,
that Manlys belief in differences in language and versification has not been
confirmed, and that the treatment of allegorical characters and the use of
the Bible are noticeably alike in the three versions.18 To the present writer it
seems that separate authorship for the A and B texts has not been proved,
but that in the C-text the attitude towards the poor, the treatment of ecclesiastics, the preoccupation with theological matters,19 numerous changes for the
14
The Lost Leaf of Piers the Plowman MP, in (1906). 359366. Manly presented his views more
fully in Piers the Plowman and its Sequence, CHEL, II. 148.
15
In Passus v of the A-text Conscience preaches a sermon which leads to confessions by the Seven
Deadly Sins. In this series of confessions the sin of Wrath is left out, and between lines 235 and 236
there is a dislocation of sense, the confession of Sloth suddenly changing to that of Robert the Robber.
The loss of a leaf at this point would explain the abrupt ending of the confession of Sloth and the
absence of a suitable introduction to the character of Robert the Robber. By assuming a manuscript
with 3040 lines to the page Manly shows that this lost leaf could have belonged to the sheet next to
the inner sheet of a gathering and that its counterfoil would come where the confession of Wrath
should occur, i.e., after the confession of Envy. The confession of Envy, as has often been noticed,
closes abruptly. The significance of this demonstration for Manlys theory of multiple authorship lies
in the fact that the author of the B-text in revising this portion of the poem did not deal with these
defects adequately and therefore could not have been the original poet.
16
The earlier articles in the controversy are reprinted in EETS, 139. For subsequent bibliography
see Wells Manual and its supplements, and Morton W.Bloomfield, Present State of Piers Plowman
Studies, Speculum, XIV (1939). 215232.
17
The best statement of the argument for single authorship is that of R.W.Chambers in his preface
to Brights book noted above.
18
Dorothy L.Owen, Piers Plowman: A Comparison with Some Earlier and Contemporary French
Allegories (1912); M.R.Adams, The Use of the Vulgate in Piers Plowman, SP, XXIV (1927). 556
566.
19
See George Sanderlin. The Character of Liberum Arbitrium in the C-text of Piers Plowman.
MLN, LVI (1941). 449453
247
worse in the text,20 and other considerations raise serious doubts about the
authorship of this version.21 Even in the B-text it cannot be denied that the
poet is incapable of steering a straight course, possibly because he has become
more deeply involved in his allegory. But until Manlys theory of a lost leaf is
more satisfactorily disposed of, his claim for separate authorship of the A, B,
and C texts cannot be dismissed.
The greatness of the poem is due almost entirely to the A and B versions.
Whatever its shortcomings in designand these are most apparent in the B
continuationwe are in the presence throughout of a powerful imagination,
wayward and rhapsodic though it is in the B-text. In the vivid delineation of
scenes and the realistic painting of character the poem bears comparison
with the best of medieval allegories, with the Roman de la Rose or the Divine
Comedy. Its distinguishing characteristic is its trenchant satire, both in sidelong
glance and direct attack. And permeating the whole is the evident sincerity of
the author or authors, the deep moral earnestness which compels us to read
every line with close attention while insuring our interest up to the very end.
So popular a poem was naturally not without imitators. A Wyclifite attack
on the friars was given the name Pierce the Ploughmans Creed 22 (c. 1394).
The author goes to each of the four orders looking for some one to teach him
the Creed, but a Minorite runs down the Carmelites, the Dominicans abuse
the Austin friars, and so on. A poor plowman named Piers abuses them all in
a long and general condemnation, finally explaining the Creed himself. The
poem, which was apparently written in London, is interesting mainly for its
outspoken criticism of the mendicant orders.
Another alliterative poem, once attributed to the author of Piers
Plowman, was published many years ago under the title Richard the
Redeless.23 Written after Richard II had been taken prisoner (September,
1399), the poem offers belated advice to the King. It criticizes him for
surrounding himself with young and inexperienced advisers who squandered
his money and thought only of fashionable clothes, and for filling the country
with retainers who wore his livery and oppressed the people. It breaks off,
shortly after the beginning of Passus IV, in the midst of an attack on the
Parliament of 1398 and its indifference to the public welfare. The poem
was known to Nicholas Brigham, a sixteenth-century antiquary, by the title
Mum, Sothsegger (Hush, Truth-teller). The identification is certain because
he quoted the first two lines (in a Latin paraphrase). When accordingly a
manuscript turned up in 1928 containing some 1750 lines of a poem made
up throughout of a dialogue between Mum and Sothsegger it seemed reasonable
20
See T.D.Hall, Was Langland the Author of the C-text of The Vision of Piers Plow man?
MLR, IV (1908). 113.
21
Even Chambers admits that C is probably much interpolated (op. cit., p. 23).
22
Edited by W.W.Skeat (1867, 1895; EETS, 30) and in a convenient small edition (Oxford, 1906).
23
Edited originally by Thomas Wright (1838; Camden Soc.) and more recently by W.W. Skeat
(1873; EETS, 54). It is also included in his edition of Piers Plowman (2V, Oxford, 1886). But see the
following note.
The
Poems
Greatness
Pierce the
Ploughmans
Creed
Richard
the
Redeless
Mum and
the Sothsegger
248
Death and
Life
to assume that the two somehow belonged together. They have now been so
published under the title Mum and the Sothsegger.24 An interval must have
separated the writing of the two parts since allusions in the new fragment to
contemporary events indicate a date for it c. 14036. The poet suggests that
the most valuable member of Henrys household would be a Truth-teller. He
fears that the King may be led by selfish counselors. Mum bids him keep
quiet. Truth-tellers get no thanks. And he finds out to his sorrow that most of
the world follows Mums policy. Finally a gardener tending his bee-hives
encourages him to go on and he will find Truth-teller in mans heart. He is
advised to write his book and give a copy to the King, whereupon he launches
into his account of the many evils which beset the country. We are conscious
of a considerable change of style as we pass from Richard the Redeless to the
later fragment and there are other difficulties which prevent us from being
sure that we are dealing with two parts of the same work, but on any other
assumption it is difficult to account for the association of the unusual names
Mum and Sothsegger with both poems.
Related more closely to Wynnere and Wastoure and to The Parlement of
the Thre Ages is a poem dating from the end of the fourteenth century but
preserved only in a seventeenth-century transcript in the Percy Folio. Death
and Life25 relates a vision in which Lady Life, described as very beautiful,
disputes with Death, a woman of horrible appearance. Recalling the theme
of Old Ages discourse in the Parlement, Death boasts of those whom she has
struck down from Adam to Lancelot and Gawain and Gala-had. But Life
tells how Death herself was vanquished, recounting the Resurrection and the
Harrowing of Hell, and finally in the character of Eternal Life assures her
followers that through baptism and the Creed they need have no fear of
Death. There are beautiful passages in the poem testifying to the continuance
of the poetical impulse in the north well after the productions of the Pearl
poet.
The alliterative poems which we have considered in this chapter have much
in common. Of them Piers Plowman would alone be sufficient to guarantee
the major importance of the group. Taken together they are the most significant
vernacular expression of English social thought in the Middle Ages.
24
Ed. Mabel Day and Robert Steele (1936; EETS, 199).

The text is in Vol. in of Bishop Percys Folio Manuscript, ed. Hales and Furnivall, but there are
more recent editions by James H.Hanford and John M.Steadman, Jr. in SP, XV (1918). 221294, and
by Sir Israel Gollancz (1930). See also Edith Scamman, The Alliterative Poem: Death and Life
Radcliffe Coll. Monographs, No. 15 (1910). 95113.
25
XVI
Chaucer: I
Geoffrey Chaucer,1 the only known son of John Chaucer, a vintner of
London, was born about 1340.2 Of his early life and education we know
nothing.3 The earliest biographical fact of which we are sure is that in April,
1357, he was a page in the household of the Countess of Ulster, wife of the
Kings son Lionel. The Countess spent the following Christmas at Hatfield
in Yorkshire, and at this time Chaucer probably made the acquaintance of
John of Gaunt, his lifelong patron and friend, who was among the guests.
In 1359 he went to France with the army, where he was taken prisoner,
1
The most valuable book for the student to have is The Complete Worlds of Geoffrey Chaucer, ed.
F.N.Robinson (Boston, 1933), with its scholarly and bibliographical apparatus. The Complete Works
of Geoffrey Chaucer, ed. Walter W.Skeat (7v, Oxford, 189497) is still of value for its notes and glossary;
it is often cited as the Oxford Chaucer. The one-volume abridgment (Oxford, 1897) and the Globe Chaucer,
ed. Alfred W.Pollard, et al. (1898) are not, or but slightly, annotated. The volume of selections from the
Canterbury Tales edited by John M.Manly (1928) contains an admirable introduction. Special
bibliographies are E.P. Hammond, Chaucer: A Bibliographical Manual (1908), D.D.Griffith, A
Bibliography of Chaucer, 19081924 (Seattle, 1928), W.E.Martin, A Chaucer Bibliography, 19251933
(Durham, N.C., 1935), and Wells Manual with its supplements. For a comprehensive survey of Chaucers
work the following can be recommended: R.K.Root, The Poetry of Chaucer (2ed., 1922), R.D.French,
A Chaucer Handbook. (2ed ;, 1947), and G.L.Kittredge, Chaucer and His Poetry (1915). Of interest in
various ways are mile Legouis, Geoffrey Chaucer (Paris, 1910; English trans., 1913), A.Brusendorff,
The Chaucer Tradition (1925), T.R.Lounsbury, Studies in Chaucer (3V, 1892), J.L.Lowes, Geoffrey
Chaucer and the Development of His Genius (1934), J.M.Manly, Some New Light on Chaucer (1926),
H.R.Patch, On Rereading Chaucer (1939), Percy V.D.Shelly, The Living Chaucer (Philadelphia, 1940).
Among special studies Walter C.Curry, Chaucer and the Medival Sciences (1926) and Edgar F.Shannon,
Chaucer and the Roman Poets (Cambridge, Mass., 1929; Harvard Stud, in Compar. Lit., VII) may be
mentioned for their wide scope. The publications of the Chaucer Society contain texts, monographs,
the Life Records compiled by W.D.Selby, F.J.Furnivall, E.A.Bond, and R.E.G.Kirk (index by E.P.Kuhl in
MP, X. 527552), and source material. There is a concordance by J.S.P.Tatlock and A.G.Kennedy
(Washington, 1927). The allusions to Chaucer are gathered together in C.F.E.Spurgeon, Five Hundred
Years of Chaucer Criticism and Allusion, 13571900 (7 parts, 191424; Chaucer Soc.; also 3v, Cambridge,
1925).The chronology of Chaucers writings has been worked out by a long succession of scholars,
so that today we may feel that the main lines have been laid down. Of major importance in this work
are F.J.Furnivall, Trial-Forewords (1871; Chaucer Soc., 2nd Ser, 6) John Koch, The Chronology of
Chaucers Writings (1890; Chaucer Soc., 2nd Ser., 27), J.S.P.Tatlock, The Development and Chronology
of Chaucers Worlds (1907; Chaucer Soc., 2nd Ser., 37), and the two articles of J.L.Lowes in PMLA,
XIX (1904). 593683 and XX (1905). 749864. For other contributions to the subject the reader must
be referred to the bibliographies mentioned earlier in this note.
2
In 1386 Chaucer testified in the Scrope-Grosvenor trial, a suit over a disputed coat of arms, and
gave his age as forty years and upwards. In the absence of any more precise indication, it seems best
to hold to a round number, although some are disposed to put the date a few years later. On the
Chaucer family see Alfred A.Kern, The Ancestry of Chaucer (Baltimore, 1906).
3
It has been suggested that he may have gone to school at St. Pauls, but the suggestion rests on
nothing more than the fact that in 1358 the schoolmaster bequeathed nearly a hundred books to the
school and the collection included many titles which Chaucer was later acquainted with. Cf. Edith
Rickert, Chaucer at School, MP, XXIX (1932). 257274.
249
Chaucers
Life
250
Public
Service
for in March, 1360, Edward III contributed 16 towards his ransom. After
October we know nothing about his life for the next six years, although
subsequent events make it likely that at some time during this period he was
taken into the Kings service. In any case, by 1366 he is already married to a
Philippa, one of the damoiselles in the Queens service, who seems to have
been the daughter of Sir Payne Roet and sister of Katherine de Swynford,
mistress and later wife of John of Gaunt.4 In 1367 Chaucer appears as a valet
in the Kings household and the next year as an esquire. As such he begins to
be employed on small missions and from then on his name occurs pretty
constantly in the records. Chaucers early history, as thus seen, is quite normal
for one whose parents were able to secure a place for their son in the household
of some noble. He was more fortunate than many, however, in being taken
into the service of a member of the royal family.
From this time on his life is a record of employment in one form or another
of public service, rewarded by pensions, grants, and special payments. He is
sent abroad frequently on the Kings business, sometimes on secret
negotiations, once as a member of the group which tried in 1381 to arrange
a marriage between Richard II and the daughter of the King of France. Most
of these journeys were to France and the Low Countries, but at least two
were to Italy. These are of special importance since they gave him an
opportunity to become acquainted with Italian literature, especially with the
work of Dante and Boccaccio. The first Italian journey which we can be sure
of was in 1372, when he went to Genoa to negotiate a commercial treaty. His
business also took him to Florence and from an allusion in the Clerks Tale it
is conjectured that he may have been in Padua and met Petrarch.5 He was
gone about six months. The second Italian mission was in 1378. This time he
was gone only four months and his business brought him in contact with
Barnabo Visconti, lord of Milan, whose death is the subject of a stanza in the
Monks Tale.
In 1374 Chaucer received the first of several appointments in the civil
service. He was made Controller of the Customs and Subsidy on Wool,
Skins, and Hides in the port of London, with the usual provision that he
should keep the records with his own hand. He was now freed from his
attendance upon the King, and went to housekeeping in an apartment
above Aldgate. During this period he seems to have enjoyed considerable
prosperity, receiving in addition to his salary and the annuities which he
and Philippa had, certain wardships and a fine which brought him in sums as
4
The relationship is not entirely clear. Katherine was the sole heir of Sir Payne Roet. Moreover
Chaucers relation to John of Gaunt does not seem to have been that of a brother-in-law. Philippa may
have been Katherines sister-in-law, in which case she would have been a Swynford. On the other hand,
Thomas Chaucer, who was almost certainly the poets son, has the Roet arms on his tomb. Philippa
seems to have had social connections since she receives a number of grants and honors, in some of
which her husband did not share.
5
The argument for the affirmative is presented by J.J.Jusserand, Did Chaucer Meet Petrarch?
Nineteenth Century, XXXIX (1896). 9931005. On this general aspect of Chaucers life see James
R.Hu!bert, Chaucers Official Life (Menasha, 1912).
CHAUCER: I
251
large as 104, the equivalent of twenty or more times that amount today. In
1382 he received the additional appointment of Controller of the Petty
Customs with permission to exercise the office by deputy. These positions he
resigned or lost in 1386. At this time he gave up his apartment over Aldgate,
and perhaps was already living in Kent, for he was appointed a justice of the
peace there in 1385 and the next year represented Kent in Parliament.6 On
this occasion he had the uncomfortable experience of seeing his friend John
of Gaunt stripped of most of his power. In June of the following year Philippa
received the last payment of her pension and it is assumed that shortly after
that she died.
In the last dozen years of his life Chaucers position and financial status
fluctuated. In 1388 he sold his annuity, apparently through necessity. However,
the next year, when Richard asserted his royal prerogative, Chaucer was
appointed Clerk of the Kings Works, in charge of the repairs and upkeep of
the royal residences and other properties. It was a fairly lucrative position and
in addition he was given special commissions of a similar nature the following
year. In September, 1390, he was robbed three times, twice on the same day, of
money belonging to the King. The thieves were caught and Chaucer was forgiven
the loss of the money. His loss of the clerkship nine months later does not seem
to be connected with the robberies. Although the King gave him a reward of
10 in 1393 and granted him an annuity of 20 the next year, he was apparently
in financial difficulty, since he was forced to borrow small sums and in 1398
was sued for debt. From about 1395 he seems to have been attached in some
capacity to John of Gaunts son, Henry of Lancaster, and when Henry was
declared king on September 30, 1399, Chaucer sent the well-known Complaint
to his Empty Purse. Four days later Henry IV responded with an annuity of 40
marks. The poet promptly leased a house in Westminster, but lived to enjoy his
new security only a few months. According to a late inscription on his tomb in
Westminster abbey, he died October 25, 1400.7
From this brief sketch of Chaucers life we may make certain observations
which will be helpful in understanding his character as a poet. In the first
place he was an active man of affairs and must have had a highly developed
practical side. Poetry was for him not a vocation but an avocation. As the
eagle says in the Hous of Fame,
For when thy labour doon al ys,
And hast mad alle thy rekenynges,
In stede of reste and newe thynges,
Thou goost horn to thy hous anoon;
And, also domb as any stoon,
6
On this period of his life see an illuminating paper by Margaret Galway, Geoffrey Chaucer, J.P.
and M.P., MLR, XXXVI (1941). 136.
7
Lewis, for whom he wrote the Astrolabe, and Thomas Chaucer, a prominent member of the
government in the early part of the fifteenth century, were probably the poets children. On the latter
see Martin B.Ruud, Thomas Chaucer (Minneapolis, 1926) and A.C. Baugh, Kirks Life Records of
Thomas Chaucer, PMLA, XLVII (1932). 461515.
Later
Years
His
Literary
Affiliations
252
Thou sittest at another book

Tyl fully daswed ys thy look. (lines 6528)
The
Romance
of the
Rose
Book
of the
Duchess
He read and he wrote because he wanted to, because there was something
within him, as in every true poet, that impelled him to write. But since writing
was a pastime he did not always take it too seriously. In the second place, all
his life was spent in association with people at the court and in government
circles, people for whom French had been not so long ago more familiar than
English and whose tastes were formed on things French. Such an environment
is sufficient to account for the fact that Chaucer is completely Continental in
his literary affiliations. He is remarkably indifferent to English writings, but
the Roman de la Rose and the poems of Machaut are his missal and breviary;
in Latin Ovid is his bible. His indebtedness to recent and contemporary French
poets, including Deschamps and Froissart, and to certain classical authors at
either first or second hand is the most noticeable characteristic of his early
work and has often led to the designation of it as his French period. With his
two journeys to Italy he comes under the influence of Italian poetry, the
Divine Comedy to some extent but more especially certain poems of Boccaccio.
With the Hous of Fame begins what is often called his Italian period. He
never deserts his first love, French poetry, so full of allegorical love visions
and their conventions, but he builds on the old framework with new matter
from Italy. It is only relatively latein certain aspects of the Troilus and
chiefly in the Canterbury Talesthat having learned all he could from his
teachers and having won the complete mastery of his art, he dares to strike
out on his own with confidence and ease. This phase of his career can only be
described as his English period.
The Roman de la Rose was the most popular and influential of all French
poems in the Middle Ages, and set a fashion in courtly poetry for two centuries
in western Europe.8 This poem Chaucer tells us he translated, and it is
altogether likely that it is one of the ways in which he served his apprenticeship
in poetry. The version which has come down to us covers only a part of the
original, and though generally printed in editions of Chaucer, is probably not
all his work. But there are passages from the Roman scattered through his
poetry as late as the Canterbury Tales.
The earliest of Chaucers original poems of any length is the Book of
the Duchess. It is an elegy recording in an unusually graceful way the loss
which John of Gaunt suffered in 1369 in the death of his first wife, Blanche.
After relating a story which he has been reading, the tragic story of Ceys
and Alcyone, the poet falls asleep and dreams that he comes upon a knight
dressed in black, sitting sorrowfully beneath a tree in the woods. The
8
It was begun about 1225 by Guillaume de Lorris as a vision picturing in allegorical form the
quest of a lover for his ideal, symbolized by a rose. It ran to only about 4000 lines. Some forty years
later it was continued by Jean de Meun in a more realistic and satirical vein, with not a little that is
frankly didactic, until it reached a length of 18,000 lines. The standard edition of the French text is by
E.Langlois (5V, 191424; SATF). There is a verse translation in English by F.S.Ellis in the Temple
Classics.
CHAUCER: I
253
stranger recognizes his solicitude and tells him the cause of his grief: he has
played a game of chess with Fortune and the goddess has taken his queen.
The poet seems not to understand quite what he means and he tells him in
detail the story of his lovehow he met one day a lady, whom he describes:
her beauty, accomplishments, gentle ways, soft speech, goodness. Her name
was White. He finally persuaded her to accept his heart and they lived in
perfect bliss full many a year. All this he relates sadly and at length. Now he
has lost her.
Allas, sir, how? what may that be?
She ys ded! Nay! Yis, be my trouthe!
Is that youre los? Be God, hyt ys routhe!
The simplicity and restraint of this close, the absence of strained sentiment,
show the delicate instinct of the artist. The poem is greatly indebted to
Machaut, Froissart, Ovid, and other poets, in fact is a mosaic of passages
borrowed or remembered, but the concept and, what is more important, the
tone and treatment are Chaucers own.
It is apparently ten years before we get another long poem from his pen,
although we can hardly believe that he wrote nothing in all this time.
However, he had been to Italy and he had read Dantes great vision of a
journey to the Inferno, to Purgatory, and to Paradise. Such earnestness and
tragic grandeur were beyond his power of emulation, but the idea of a
journey to regions unknown was one which he could turn to his own
purposes. The Hous of Fame, generally dated about 1379, is a badly
proportioned, incomplete, and utterly delightful poem. It is in three books,
with all the of epic machinery of invocations, proems, apostrophes, and the
like. In the first book the poet dreams that he is in the temple of Venus,
where he reads on the wall and tells at length the story of Dido and neas.
The episode is pleasantly related but is a digression and is artistically one of
the blemishes in the poem. At the end he steps out of doors and sees flying
toward him an eagle of great size and shining so brightly that it appears to
be of gold. It is obviously of the same family as Dantes eagle in the ninth
book of the Purgatorio. The eagle seizes him in its claws and immediately
soars aloft with him, telling him that Jove means to reward him for his long
service to Venus and Cupid by taking him to the house of Fame where he
will hear abundant tidings of Loves folk. The second book is wholly taken
up with the eagles flight and is one of the most delightfully humorous
episodes in literature, what with the eagles friendliness and loquacity, and
the poets utter terror. The contrast between the eagles talkativeness and
familiarityhe calls him Geoffreyand the speechless fright of the poet,
who can answer only in monosyllables, Yes and Well and Nay, is
high comedy. Unfortunately the third book, which describes what the poet
saw when the eagle set him down outside of Fames house, carries us to the point
where he is about to hear an announcement from a man of greet auctoritee
and leaves us still waiting for the expected news. For at this point the poem
The Hous
of Fame
254
Anelida
and Arcite
Parlement
of Foules
breaks off. Scholars have interpreted the poem in different ways and taken it
perhaps too seriously. Some have seen in it an allegory of the poets life,9 others
a conventional love vision of a kind for which French literature furnished many
models,10 and still others have tried to solve the mystery of the news which the
poet is about to hear. One explanation 11 holds that Chaucers purpose was to
introduce a series of stories as in the Legend of Good Women and the Canterbury
Tales. But it seems likely from an allusion at the beginning of Book Three to
this lytel laste bok that the poem as we have it is nearly complete and that
the announcement was something which Chaucer decided not to write or
perhaps later suppressed.
If the Hous of Fame was left unfinished, it would be far from the only work
which Chaucer began and did not complete. At about this time he apparently
started what was to be a considerable poem of Anelida and Arcite, but after
some three hundred lines he abandoned the project. It is a pity that it remains
such a fragment, if for no other reason than that it keeps from the full recognition
of its worth the beautiful Complaint of Anelida, which with its perfect balance
of strophe and antistrophe is one of the most finished and charming examples
of the type in medieval literature. To this period may also belong some of the
shorter pieces such as the Complaint unto Pity and A Complaint to his Lady.
The Parlement of Foules is clearly an occasional poem, but the occasion
for which it was written is not so clear. It takes its theme from the popular
belief that on St. Valentines day the birds choose their mates, and it
accordingly represents a gathering of birds for that purpose. Dame Nature
holds on her hand a formel or female eagle of great beauty and goodness,
for whom three royal and noble eagles make their respective pleas. Although
Nature advises in favor of the royal suitor, the formel asks and is granted a
year in which to make her choice. There is much amusing by-play over the
impatience of the lesser birds and the varied opinions that they express,
but one cannot escape the thought that the essence of the poem is the
competition of the three noble eagles for the hand of the worthy formel.
The most commonly accepted interpretation is that the poem celebrates
the betrothal of Richard II. to Anne of Bohemia, whom he married in January,
1382. The rival suitors according to this theory were Friedrich of Meissen
and Charles VI of France.12 Other interpretations have been suggested,13
9
Sandras, Ten Brink, and early scholars quite generally.

W.O.Sypherd, Studies in Chaucers Hous of Fame (1907; Chaucer Soc., 2nd Ser., 39).
11
J.M.Manly, What Is Chaucers Hous of Fame? Kittredge Anniversary Papers (Boston, 1913).
PP. 7381.
12
The interpretation was proposed by Koch in 1877 and modified by O.F.Emerson, The Suitors
in Chaucers Parlement of Foules, MP, VIII (191011). 4562; reprinted in Chaucer Essays and Studies
(Cleveland, 1929). The objections to it were summed up by J.M.Manly, What Is the Parlement of
Foules? Festschrift fr Lorenz Morsbach (Halle, 1913; Studien zur englischen Phil, 50), pp. 279290.
13
Edith Rickert, A New Interpretation of the Parlement of Foules, MP, XVIII (1920). 129,
identified the formel eagle with Philippa, a daughter of John of Gaunt. More recently Haldeen Braddy,
in The Parlement of Foules: A New Proposal, PMLA. XLVI (1931). 10071019, and in subsequent
papers, has suggested a connection with negotiations in 1377 for the marriage of Richard with the
princess Marie of France. For parallels to the general situation se Willard F.Faraham. The Contending
Lovers, PMLA. XXXV (1920). 247323.
10
CHAUCER: I
255
and if none of them carries complete conviction, the fact need not detract
from our enjoyment of the poem as one of Chaucers smaller but most finished
productions.
At about this time, somewhere in the early eighties, Chaucer translated
the Consolation of Philosophy of Boethius,14 if we may judge by the fact that
its influence is very noticeable in such poems as Palamon and Arcite (included
in the Canterbury Tales as the Knights Tale) and Troilus and Criseyde, which
were written, it would seem, between 1382 and 13856. It is significant as an
indication of the range of Chaucers interests, but as a translation it leaves
much to be desired. Chaucers prose both here and in the Astrolabe (1391),
and in the prose tales included in the Canterbury Tales as well, is formless
and undistinguished.
Troilus and Criseyde15 is at once Chaucers longest complete poem and his
greatest artistic achievement. In some 8000 lines, in stanzas of rime royal, it
tells a tragic love story from the time Troilus first sees Criseyde, a young and
beautiful widow whose father, Calchas, has abandoned Troy and gone over
to the Greek side, until she proves unfaithful to him, and death puts an end to
his suffering. For three skilfully ordered books the story rises steadily to a
climax when Troilus, with the aid of Pandarus, his friend and the uncle of
Criseyde, having overcome her natural caution and conventional reserve,
finally possesses her completely, both body and soul. For three years they are
united in a mutual love that could not be more complete. Then in the last two
books events move inevitably toward their tragic conclusion. Through an
exchange of prisoners Criseyde must go to her father in the Greek camp. She
leaves, swearing undying love and fidelity and promising to find some way of
returning before ten days are past. But by the time the ten days are up her
handsome Greek escort, Diomede. has caused her to change her mind, and
within a few months she has given him the brooch which had been Troiluss
parting gift to her when she left.
The main features of the story Chaucer took from a poem by Boccaccio
called the Filostrato.16 Boccaccio had found the latter part of it in Benot
14
Boethius illustrates the medieval conception of tragedy, the fall of a great man from his high
estate. In the innermost counsels of the emperor Theodoric, he was accused of disloyalty, thrown into
prison, and eventually (524) put to death. The Consolation of Philosophy was written in prison, and
was so in harmony with Christian teaching on the questions which it discusses that it became one of
the most widely read books of the Middle Ages. For the earlier translation due to King Alfred, see
above, p. 99. It was later translated by Queen Elizabeth, See Howard R.Patch, The Tradition of Boethius:
A Study of His Importance in Medieval Culture (1935).
15
The definitive edition of the poem is that of R.K.Root (Princeton, 1926). Professor Root has
settled a long controversy over the date of the poem by identifying a rare astronomical phenomenon
mentioned in Book in, which shows that it could not have been finished before May, 1385. Cf. R.K.Root
and H.N.Russell, A Planetary Date for Chaucers Troilus, PMLA, XXXIX (1924). 4863. See also
Thomas A.Kirby, Chaucers Troilus: A Study in Courtly Love (University, La., 1940; Louisiana State
Univ. Stud., No. 39).
16
As is well known, the story of the Trojan war was familiar to the Middle Ages not through
Homer but in two late accounts by Dares Phrygius and Dictys Cretensis. These were made the basis,
about 1155, of the French poem by Benot mentioned in the text. An account in Latin prose, the
Historia Trojana, was taken from Benots poem about 1287 by Guido della Colonna. (ed. N.E.Griffin.
Cambridge, Mass., 1936; Mediaeval Acad. of Amer., Pub. No. 26). Boccaccio adopted from Benot
Boethius
Troilus
and
Criseyde
256
Relation to de Sainte-More, who had hit upon the idea of filling out with a love story the
Boccaccios lagging intervals between periods of fighting in his Roman de Troie. All that
part of the story which precedes Criseydes departure for the Greek camp is
Filostrato
due to Boccaccio, and he also created the character of Pandarus. But while
Chaucers indebtedness to the Italian poem is very great, his own contribution
is still greater. He has basically altered the character of Pandarus and he has
added complexity and mystery to Criseyde until she is much more than Troiluss
mistress. Without losing its essential qualities of medieval romance or
abandoning the conventions of courtly love, Troilus and Criseyde has taken
on many of the characteristics of the psychological novel. It should be
remembered that less than 2600 lines in Chaucers poem have their counterparts
in Boccaccio.
What gives the story its chief interest and acts as a constant challenge to
The
understanding is the character of Criseyde. She combines the qualities that
Character
of Criseyde will always appeal in woman, beauty and mystery. Her behavior is never
transparent and we try without complete success to penetrate the mingling of
impulses and the complex workings of her mind. In her early defensive attitude
toward the advances of Troilus there is probably a mixture of caution and the
courtly love tradition which expected the woman to be difficult to approach.
She is more interested in her reputation than her virtue. Her ultimate surrender
is brought about partly by circumstance, but when she yields it is because she
has made her own decision. How much of her emotion is the womanly love of
being loved we cannot say, but during the three years that she gives herself to
Troilus her affection is genuine and complete. When finally as a result of
separation she abandons him for Diomede she reproaches herself, but her love
is not the kind that is proof against every storm. Her father was a traitor and
an opportunist; she was of a yielding disposition, slydynge of corage. When
in the end she gives Diomede gifts which Troilus had given her, we cannot but
admit that she was without depth of feeling. And yet withal, her faults spring
from weakness rather than baseness of character, and the poet in pleading that
we judge her not too harshly says, I would excuse her if I could.
The Legend of Good Women was begun, according to the prologue, as
The
a penance imposed by Queen Alceste for his offenses against the God of
Legend of
Love in writing the Troilus and the Romance of the Rose, which speak
Good
slightingly of women. Chaucer refers to the work elsewhere as the Seintes
Women
Legende of Cupide, and it was to be a collection of nineteen stories about
women famous for their faithfulness in love. A twentieth and longer legend
of Alceste would doubtless have completed the whole. The most interesting
part of the poem is the long Prologue, with its frank enjoyment of nature
the love story, keeping only as much of the war and the fighting as he needed for background to the
Troilus and Criseyde story. The Filostrato can be had most conveniently with an English translation in
The Filostrato of Giovanni Boccaccio, by N.E.Griffin and A.B.Myrick (Philadelphia, 1929), with an
excellent introduction on the development of the story. See also Karl Young, The Origin and
Development of the Story of Troilus and Criseyde (Chaucer Soc., 1908).
CHAUCER: I
257
and the spring, its amusing picture of the God of Loves anger at the poet, the
Queens generous intercession, the partly gratuitous enumeration of his works,
and the penance that is imposed upon him. Some of the legends had been
written earlier, but even so, the poem as it has come down to us is unfinished,
breaking off in the midst of the ninth legend. It has been suggested that Chaucer
found the idea too monotonous. If the suggestion recently made 17 that he
was writing the poem for Joan, the widow of the Black Prince, is accepted,
we might assume that her death in August, 1385, removed the immediate
occasion for writing it. It does not make any easier our understanding the
fact that he subjected the Prologue to a very careful revision in 1394; one
does not ordinarily devote so much time and labor to the preliminary part of
an unfinished work. In any case, if he abandoned the project originally to
devote himself to the Canterbury Tales, we cannot feel regret, and to this, his
last and best-known work, we turn in the next chapter.
17
Margaret Galway, Chaucers Sovereign Lady: A Study of the Prologue to the Legend and Related
Poems, MLR, XXXIII (1938). 145199. Objection to so early a date, based on Chaucers supposed
use of Deschamps Lai de Franchise, has little force. See Marian Lossing, The Prologue to the Legend
of Good Women and the Lai de Franchise, SP, XXXIX (1942). 1535.
XVII
Chaucer: II
The Canterbury Tales
The
Framed
Tale
If Chaucer had never written anything more than the works considered in
the preceding chapter, he would have been recognized as a great poet, but he
would not have been so popular a poet since his popularity today rests in
large measure upon the Canterbury Tales.1 Any one who knows anything
about Chaucer knows the Canterbury Tales. He knows the General Prologue
with its wonderful portrait gallery of pilgrims, and he knows at least some of
the tales. And he would be willing to admit perhaps that such a work deserves
closer acquaintance.
It would seem that about 1387 Chaucer, having finished or laid aside the
Legend of Good Women, conceived the idea of writing a collection of stories
of more varied character. He doubtless had on hand some material suitable
for his purpose, such as the Palamon and Arcite, which in the Prologue to the
Legend of Good Women he had said was little known, and the lyf also of
Seynt Cecile, mentioned in the same place. The idea of binding a collection
of stories together in a framework is a familiar one in literature. It extends
from ancient India to Uncle Remus. Chaucers plan was to relate 120 stories
and have them told by a group of pilgrims, thirty in number, journeying from
London to Canterbury. Each pilgrim agrees to tell two tales each way. Harry
Bailey, the Host of the Tabard Inn, where Chaucer and the other travelers
assemble, agrees to go along and act as master of ceremonies. It was an admirable
method for bringing together people of various types and different social classes.
The group includes a knight and an esquire, his son, professional men like the
doctor and the lawyer, a merchant, a shipman, various representatives of the
religious orders such as the prioress, the monk, the honest parson, and the
friar, a substantial farmer, a miller, a reeve, a London cook, and several craftsmen,
not to attempt a complete list. Nearly all are described with such particularity
as to suggest that in some cases at least Chaucer was drawing his portraits
from individuals in real life.2 How the suggestion for such a plan came to
him, if not from experience, we cannot say. Boccaccio had used a somewhat
1
Full critical apparatus is provided for the study of the Canterbury Tales in J.M.Manly and Edith
Rickert, The Text of the Canterbury Tales (8v, Chicago, 1940). A new collection of Sources and
Analogues of Chaucers Canterbury Tales has been prepared by a group of scholars under the editorship
of W.F.Bryan and Germaine Dempster (Chicago, 1941).
2
For one or two plausible identifications and a number of interesting speculations see J.M. Manly,
Some New Light on Chaucer (1926).
258
CHAUCER: II
259
analogous idea in the Decameron, a collection of a hundred stories told by

ten people of the gentle class who have retired within a palace to escape the
plague. It is unlikely that Chaucer knew the Decameron, since if he had known
it he would certainly have made use of it. In any case, Chaucers plan admits
of greater discrepancies among the pilgrims, greater variety in the stories
they can appropriately tell, and greater opportunity for incidental adventure.
A closer analogy is found in the Novelle3 of Giovanni Sercambi, written about
1374. Here we have actually the device of a pilgrimage, with a leader and byplay among the pilgrims, but the stories are all told by the author. It is unlikely
that Chaucer was acquainted with this collection for the same reason as that
which we have alleged in the case of the Decameron. At present we can best
believe that Chaucers plan for the Canterbury Tales was a happy idea of his
own.
The plan laid down in the General Prologue was only partially carried
out. There are but twenty-four tales, and of these, two are interrupted before
the end and two break off shortly after they get under way. Even before
Chaucer laid aside the work, possibly about 1395, there are indications that
he had altered his original intention. At the beginning of the Parsons Tale
the Host says, Now lakketh us no tales mo than oon, showing that Chaucer
then had in mind only one tale from each pilgrim. There are many marks of
the unfinished state in which he left the work. In putting his life of St. Cecilia
in the mouth of the Second Nun he neglected to make the necessary revision
and she accordingly refers to herself as an unworthy son of Eve. The Man of
Law says he will speak in prose, but instead he tells the story of Constance in
well-turned stanzas. The Shipmans Tale was apparently written for the Wife
of Bath, with the result that this good felawe whose beard had been shaken
by many a tempest alludes to himself as a woman; and some students have
seen equally clear evidence that the Merchants Tale was originally intended
for one of the religious pilgrims.4 Small matters like this are not serious.
What is much more troublesome is the fact that we cannot now tell in what
order the tales would have ultimately been arranged.
The beginning is clear enough. When the party has ridden a short distance
out of town Harry Bailey bids them draw lots and by good luck or
manipulation the lot falls to the Knight to tell the first tale. He relates the
story of the love of two friends, Palamon and Arcite, for the same lady.
When he finishes, the pilgrims all express enthusiastic approval and the
Host, pleased at so good a start, calls upon the Monk to tell the next tale.
But the Miller is drunk and unruly and insists on telling his story in spite of
all entreaty. His indecent tale is about a carpenter, and when he finishes,
the Reeve, who was of carpenteris craft, takes offense and tells an equally
3
Karl Young, The Plan of the Canterbury Tales, Kittredge Anniv. Papers (Boston, 1913), pp.
405417, and Robert A.Pratt and Karl Young in Sources and Analogues, pp. 181.
4
The present writer believes that the evidence clearly points to the Friar (The Original Teller of
the Merchants Tale, MP, XXXV (1937). 1526); for a dissenting opinion see Germaine Dempster,
ibid., XXXVI (1938). 18.
Earlier
Examples
The
Unfinished
Character
of the
Work
The
Groups
260
Dramatic
Character
vulgar story about a miller. Chaucer has evidently an eye to contrast and
means to offset the seriousness of the Knights story with these two in a
lighter vein. The Cook next exclaims with glee over the Reeves story and
offers to tell a joke about an apprentice in the city. But Chaucer must have
felt that three humorous stories in a row would be too many and stopped
after fifty lines. Up to this point the sequence of tales is clear; the
incompleteness of the Cooks Tale, however, leaves us with no hint as to
what was to follow. Other stories are bound together into groups in a similar
way, but the arrangement of the groups is not indicated. In some of the stories
and links there are occasional allusions to the time of day and to places along
the way. These apparently guided scribes or editors, as we should say, of
manuscripts, but there is great variation among the early texts. Modern
editions usually follow the arrangement of the Ellesmere manuscript or adopt
an arrangement of the groups that does least violence to the local allusions.
The precise order of all the tales is something which at his death Chaucer
himself had not settled.
The Canterbury Tales is more than a collection of stories. It is a pageant of
fourteenth-century life, a comdie humaine, in which a group of thirty people
of various classes act their parts on this mundane stage in such a way as to
reveal their private lives and habits, their changing moods as well as their
prevailing dispositions, their qualities good and bad. Much of this life is
revealed not by the stories they tell but by their behavior along the road and
their remarks by the way. Chaucer never lets us forget that the stories in his
collection are part of a pilgrimage, incidental to it in fact, and in the links
between the tales he accomplishes his end in a variety of ways. Most important
is the part played by Harry Bailey, the hearty, boisterous Host, with his
frankness, his rough humor, his unconscious profanity which so shocks the
Parson, and his good sense. He twits the pilgrims, draws the shy ones out,
shows a clumsy deference to those entitled to it, smooths over differences,
and keeps the company generally in good spirits. There are, of course, quarrels,
and these are used most effectively to introduce some of the stories. The
Reeves resentment of the Millers tale has been mentioned. A similar feud
breaks out later between the Friar and the Summoner and results in the telling
by each of them of a story defaming the others calling. A humorous and
realistic touch is given when some story proves tiresome and the speaker is
cut short. The effect is particularly ironic when it is Chaucers own story that
the Host objects to, but it is a useful device, too, when the lugubrious tragedies
of the Monk threaten to weary the reader as well as the original company.
One of the most realistic incidents is that in which the pilgrims are overtaken
at Boughton-under-Blee by a Canon and his Yeoman. The Yeoman talks too
freely about his masters private affairs and the Canon rides off for verray
sorwe and shame. Whether the Yeoman tells a story because Chaucer noticed
that his pilgrims were short one of their thirty or because he saw an opportunity
of using in this way his knowledge of the frauds practised by alchemists we
CHAUCER: II
261
shall never know. In any case, the incident contributes much to our feeling
that a minor drama is being unfolded all along the route.
A lesser unity is achieved at least once within the whole by the concentration
in a fairly close sequence of several stories which deal in one way or another
with the problem of marriage. The question is opened by the Wife of Bath,
whose philosophy of life is distinctly earthy. She has had five husbands and is
not unwilling to take a sixth. She openly renounces the idea that virginity is
to be preferred by all to matrimony. But she is equally frank in describing her
former husbands and in telling how she maintained the upper hand over all
of them. Her theory, confirmed by practice, has been that happiness in marriage
depends on the acceptance of the wifes mastery, and the story she tells of the
knight and the loathly lady is meant to illustrate and enforce this view. Any
debate that might have been provoked by a doctrine so contrary to medieval
notions is prevented by the quarrel between the Friar and the Summoner,
which bursts into flame as soon as she has finished, but when each has told
his story and cooled his wrath the Host calls on the Clerk for a tale. The tale
which he tells is one of a womans submission to her husband, the story of
Patient Griselda, whose patience was finally rewarded with happiness. There
is sharp contrast at least between the Wifes and the Clerks stones. The
Merchant next tells the story of January and May, a fabliau about an old
man who marries a young wife and is shamefully tricked by her. It introduces
a somewhat different marriage problem. The Squires Tale which follows is a
fragment of Eastern romance and has nothing to do with marriage, nor has
the Franklins Tale, which is a story of generosity and honor put to a severe
test. But in the story told by the Franklin the married life of Arviragus and
Dorigen is so harmonious and happy, and their relations are governed by
such mutual tolerance and forbearance as well as confidence and love, that it
is easy to see in it the ideal solution of the marriage relationship. Their vows
express this forbearance and in a long aside the Franklin voices the conviction
that
Love wol not been constreynd by maistrye.
Whan maistrie comth, the God of Love anon
Beteth his wynges, and farewel, he is gon!
The Marriage Group, as the sequence here surveyed is called, is brought to
a close with the Franklins Tale and it is thus natural to suppose that the
views of the Franklin were those of Chaucer himself.5
5
The existence of a Marriage Group was first suggested by Miss Hammond (Manual, p. 256), but
the full exposition of the idea is due to Professor Kittredge, in an article called Chaucers Discussion
of Marriage, MP, IX (1912). 435467. A number of scholars deny a conscious intention on Chaucers
part to present a marriage group, and point out that various aspects of marriage and maistrie in
marriage are presented in several other tales as well. Full reference to the scholarly literature on the
question will be found in the bibliographies mentioned on p. 249.
The
So-Called
Marriage
Group
262
An
Anthology
of
Medieval
Literature
Chaucers
Character
as a Poet
Viewed merely as a collection of separate pieces, the Canterbury Tales in

its extent and variety offers a remarkable anthology of medieval literature.
The courtly romance is represented well enough by the Knights Tale or the
story of Constance told by the Man of Law, not to mention the fragmentary
Squires Tale, while we have in Sir Thopas a parody of the more popular type
of romance, such as Guy of Warwick and Bevis of Hampton. The Franklins
Tale is a Breton lay, with its setting in Brittany, its fidelity of true lovers, and
its element of the supernatural or marvelous. The Physicians Tale of Virginius
and his daughter, whom he kills to save her honor, is the retelling of a classical
legend, like many examples in Old French literature and like Chaucers own
Ceys and Alcyone in the Book of the Duchess. The Wife of Baths Tale is
a folk-tale which was often given literary form. The coarser type of story is
represented by a quarter of the collection, by the fabliaux of the Miller, Reeve,
Merchant, and others. Two widespread religious types appear in the saints
legend (St. Cecilia) told by the Second Nun and in the miracle of the Virgin
related so beautifully by the Prioress. The Monks numerous examples of
great men who have fallen from their high estate to misery and death are
tragedies, as the Middle Ages understood the word, while the story of the
three rogues told by the Pardoner is an exemplum, one of thousands of such
stories with which preachers adorned their sermons and pointed a moral.
The sermon or didactic treatise, though hardly to be considered a tale in the
most liberal sense of the word, is represented by the Parsons Tale and by
Chaucers own second attempt, the Melibeus. Finally, we have a truly
magnificent example of the beast fable, familiar to every one in the Middle
Ages through Reynard the Fox, in the story of Chauntecleer and Dame Pertelot
which the Nuns Priest tells. Without forcing matters we might note that
there are even examples of the short lyric in the Envoy to the Clerks Tale
and the Invocation to Mary at the beginning of the Second Nuns Tale.
The Canterbury Tales is a miniature five-foot shelf of medieval literature.
When we look at Chaucers poetry as a whole and try to comprehend its
character in its larger aspects, we must recognize that this character was
due partly to his environment, partly to himselfthe mysterious combination
of hereditary qualities that made him the kind of person he was. Environment
made him a court poet. He wrote for the circle in which he lived; therefore
we see him as a graceful occasional poet and a teller of tales. The tastes of
the court, as we have said, had been formed on French literature6 and as
his environment determined his education and literary background, so
he was attracted by, and his literary tastes were almost wholly formed upon,
the literature of France and Rome and later of medieval Italy. He
scarcely refers to English writings, and when he does it is to parody the
romances or to refer somewhat humorously to riming rum-ram-ruf. Of
course he was the heir of previous centuries of English civilization and of a
language adequate for his purpose, but what he owes to previous English
6
Cf. the note on Richard IIs books on p. 142.
CHAUCER: II
263
writers is slight in comparison with his debt to French and Latin and Italian
books. Others had translated and adapted French works before, but nobody
else, either in his own day or before or after his day, so completely transferred
to English the whole spirit of polite literature in Europe. This much of his
poetic character comes from the accident of environment; the rest comes
from himself. Environment could not make him the incomparable storyteller
that he was. And environment alone will not account for the largeness and
sanity of his mind. It may have taught him to keep his own counsel on political
and public questions or to keep his opinions on such matters out of his poetry.
But it may be that he was not easily wrought up over issues which at times
provoke the quiet laughter of the gods. He was by nature tolerant, gentle,
whimsical, good-humored, at all events in his poetry. And he had an
incomparable sense of humor. His humor is allpervasive. It flickers and glows
and occasionally flashes like lightning in a summer sky. At times he seems
unable to repress it, as when in the Book of the Duchess, a poem upon a sad
occasion, he offers the God of Sleep the best gift he can think of, a feather
bed, if he will make him sleep like Alcyone. But this is only at times. When
the occasion really calls for it he can be serious, and he is capable of deep
pathos.
Chaucer is sometimes denied the rank of a great poet on the ground that
he lacked the higher seriousness, that his poetry is without great themes nobly
conceived. It is true that he is not given to lofty and impassioned sentiments.
His Paradise Lost is but the earthly paradise that Troilus lost, and his
Purgatorio is generally such as lovers and lesser mortals experience in this
life. But no one can deny the dignity and seriousness of the Troilus at certain
great moments in the poem. We know that he was capable of moral earnestness
and deep feeling, and if he chose more often to be cheerful and in general to
devote himself to lighter themes, there are some students of medieval
literatureand not the least devoted among themwho rest content with
his choice.
XVIII
Other Contemporaries of Chaucer
The
Moral
Gower
His Life
When Chaucer at the close of Troilus and Criseyde addressed his book to a
fellow poet with the salutation O moral Gower, he was paying his friend a
sincere compliment, little supposing that the adjective would in time acquire
a connotation anything but helpful to John Gowers reputation with modern
readers. But we have become suspicious of literature aimed at our
improvement, and are prepared to be bored by anything to which a moral, or
the word moral, is attached. Gower is the victim of this prejudice. But it must
also be admitted that he suffers by comparison with his greater contemporary.
Although the names of Chaucer and Gower were constantly coupled together
with equal respect throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, nowadays
we rightly prefer Chaucers humanity and humor to the unrelieved earnestness
of Gowers larger works. Yet modern criticism has sometimes gone too far in
dismissing this dignified figure with an impatient shrug.
It is surprising how little we know about a man who was personally known
to both Richard II and Henry IV and who has left us a body of poetry that
fills four large volumes. He was of a Kentish family, and had considerable
wealth, which it is conjectured he made in trade. But if we decline to identify
with the poet a John Gower who was connected with some questionable
transactions in land, we know him only for his friendship with Chaucer, later
strained, as the owner of certain manors in Norfolk and Suffolk, and as a
liberal benefactor in his will of churches in South-wark.1 In his later years he
had an apartment in the priory of St. Mary Overy, in Southwark. Late in life
(1398) he married Agnes Groundolf, perhaps his second wife. No children
are mentioned in his will, which was probated Oct. 24, 1408. He died
presumably in that month and was buried in the priory church, now St.
Saviours, where his tomb can still be seen.
The effigy on Gowers tomb shows the poets head resting on three folio
volumes bearing the titles Speculum Meditantis, Vox Clamantis, and
Confessio Amantis. These are his three principal works.2 Though their titles are
1
In 1393 as an esquire in the service of Henry Earl of Derby he was given a collar. Two months
after the Earl became Henry IV he granted (Nov. 21, 1399) for life to the kings esquire John Gower
two pipes of wine of Gascony yearly. CPR, 13991401, p. 128 and CCR, 13991402, p. 78. On Dec.
II, 1397 Thomas Caudre, canon in the priory of St. Mary Overy in Southwerke was bound to do or
procure no hurt or harm to John Gower; CCR, 139699, p. 238. Cf. also CCR, 14025, p. 484.
2
The Complete Works of John Gower, ed. G.C.Macaulay (4v, Oxford, 18991902). Cf. George
R.Coffman, John Gower in His Most Significant Role, Univ. of Colorado Stud., Ser. B, Vol. H, No.
4 (1945). 5261.
264
OTHER CONTEMPORARIES OF CHAUCER
265
in Latin the poems are in French, Latin, and English respectively. The first,
also known as Speculum Hominis or Mirour de lOmme (before 1381), consists
of some 30,000 lines of French verse. It treats in great detail the Seven Deadly
Sins and their daughters, then in equal fullness the corresponding Virtues,
and shows the effects of the conflict between the two groups in all classes of
society from Pope and cardinals down to craftsmen and laborers, concluding
with a long tribute to the Virgin. The work is carefully planned and in spite
of its great length is no more tedious than other works of its kind. It shows
general resemblances to treatises like the Somme le Roi and the Miroir du
Monde, but no immediate source has been found.3 The Vox Clamantis, a
Latin poem of 10,000 lines, was written shortly after the Peasants Revolt in
1381, of which the first third of the poem gives a vivid account. This part
may have been a later addition, for the major theme of the poem is a
representation, like that in the Mirour de lOmme, of the evils of society
clergy, knighthood, peasantryand of man as a microcosm in which the sins
of the world are abundantly exhibited. Gower has borrowed extensively from
previous Latin poets, classical and medieval, but he obviously handles his
Latin fluently and forcefully. The Confessio Amantis is the work of Gowers
later years, when he had come to realize that a didactic intent unrelieved by
entertaining features does not win many readers:
Bot for men sein, and soth it is,
That who that al of wisdom writ
It dulleth ofte a mannes wit
To him that schal it aldai rede,
For thilke cause, if that ye rede,
I wolde go the middel weie
And wryte a bok betwen the tweie,
Somwhat of lust, somewhat of lore.
He will therefore write of Love. He is himself one of Loves unrewarded
servants. Venus hears his complaints and bids him confess to her priest,
Genius. But a priest hears confessions of sin, and so the scheme of the poem
is the Seven Deadly Sins, expounded by the priest, and applied, not always
very easily, to the lovers problems. Stories illustrate the various points as
they arise. It is obvious that as a framework for a collection of tales, Gowers
plan is much inferior to Chaucers. But to criticize it on this score is quite
unfair. It assumes that the framework is an excuse for telling a series of
stories, whereas in Gowers case the stories are secondary, a concession to
his public. He is still the moralist and preacher; he has not abandoned the
didactic purpose, but is attempting to make his teaching more palatable
by a liberal use of tales and anecdotes. Under the circumstances it is
surprising how well he can tell a story. He is neither dramatic nor humorous
3
See above, p. 202, and cf. R.Elfreda Fowler, Une Source franaise des pomes de Gowes (Macon.
1805).
Mirour de
lOmme
Vox
Clamantis
Confessio
Amantis
266
Gower as
Poet
Barbours
Bruce
Andrew of
Wyntoun
Increasing
Use of
Prose
His nature was essentially sober, but his narrative is always fluent, generally
rapid, and at times marked by genuine grace of both language and metre.
The popularity of the Confessio Amantis is attested by more than forty extant
manuscripts.4
Gower is not a great poet. He is an earnest man with a message for his
times. He is alarmed at the way the world is going. He exhorts the King,
preaches to the public. He is for reform within the established order. He is
opposed to Lollardry, and the Peasants Revolt fills him with horror. What
more can the serious and thoughtful layman do than try to arouse his
contemporaries to action?
If we look to the north, to Scotland, we meet at this time, in addition to
some of the poems in the alliterative revival, the famous work of John Barbour
called The Bruce (1376),5 relating in more than 13,000 lines the guerilla
warfare between Robert Bruce and the English. The poet is equally stirred by
the deeds of Douglas, Bruces loyal supporter, and indeed closes his poem
with Douglass adventures in Spain, in which he met his death. Barbour was
Archdeacon of Aberdeen and died in 1395. He calls his poem a romance, and
the style and spirit of the narrative partly justify the designation, but this
should not blind us to the fact that Barbour was of a studious nature and a
man of wide reading. He meant his work to be taken as history, and in many
places his narrative is believed to embody authentic tradition.6 Barbours
younger contemporary, Andrew of Wyntoun, held The Bruce in such regard
that he incorporated a portion of it in his Original Chronicle7 This, in its
30,000 lines of eight-syllable verse, covers the period from the origin of the
world (whence its name) down to the year 1408. In form and matter it belongs
with The Bruce, although chronologically it falls in the fifteenth century. It
was completed shortly after 1420.
It is worth a moments reflection that none of Chaucers writings in verse
leave us with the feeling that they could just as well have been in prose.
This is not true of all his contemporaries. The Mirour de lOmme and the
Vox Clamantis deal largely with subjects for which prose would be
appropriate, and the same may be said of Wyntouns Chronicle. As the
fourteenth century wears on we notice the greater use of prose, for reasons
which become more influential in the fifteenth century and which will be discussed
4
Gower is the author of a series of Cinkante Balades of love and a Traiti consisting of eighteen
additional balades in French for married lovers. Both sequences are among the most graceful of his
poems. He also composed other short pieces and a Chronica Tripertita in Latin, begun in 1387 and
continued at intervals, dealing with events in the later years of Richards reign.
5
Edited by W.W.Skeat (4V, 187089; EETSES, II, 21, 29, 55; reprinted in 1894 for the STS, 31
33). On the Scottish literature of the period see T.F.Henderson, Scottish Vernacular Literature (3ed.,
Edinburgh, 1910) and Friedrich Brie, Die Nationale Literatur Schottlands von den Anfngen bis zur
Renaissance (Halle, 1937).
6
The contention of J.T.T.Brown, The Wallace and the Bruce Restudied (Bonn, 1900; Bonner
Beitrge zur Anglistik, VI), that the text as we have it was seriously tampered with by John Ramsay,
the copyist, at the end of the fifteenth century, has been resented but not disproved, and has something
to recommend it.
7
The best edition is that of F.J.Amours (6V, Edinburgh, 190314: STS, 50, 53, 54, 56, 57, 63).
267
in the next chapter. Here we are concerned chiefly with the writings of three
men, Mandeville, Trevisa, and Wyclif.
The Travels of Sir John Mandeville is one of the best-known books of the
Middle Ages. Everyone knows about the incredible things he pretends to
have seen: the gigantic race with one eye in the middle of the forehead, people
with no heads but with eyes in their shoulders, others with great ears hanging
to their knees, snails so great that many persons may lodge in their shells,
and scores of other marvels. Setting out to write merely a guide-book for
those who might be making a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, he gives the usual
account of routes, and towns, and places of interest at the more important
points. But when this part of his plan is finished he continues with his travels
in Egypt, Asia Minor, Persia, India, Cathay or China, and many other places.
He professes to have been born at St. Albans, to have left England in 1322,
and, after spending years on his vast journey, to have arrived at Lige, where
he was persuaded to write down his experiences.8 The original, composed
apparently between 1366 and 1371,9 was in French, but it was soon translated
into Latin and English. There are at least two translations into English, one
from the Latin and one from the French original.10 The earliest English
manuscripts are of the beginning of the fifteenth century, but it cannot be
doubted that the translations were made soon after the original appeared.
In the last fifty years the sources of Mandevilles Travels have been
minutely traced, and it is now known that the whole work is a compilation
which could have been written without the authors venturing a foot from
home. What is more, it has even been thought the work of a Lige physician
generally known as John of Burgundy or John with the beard (ad Barbara),
the author of other works including medical treatises and a lapidary.11 The
8
References to thirty-four different John Mandevilles in medieval England are gathered together
by K.W.Cameron, A Discovery in John de Mandevilles, Speculum, XI (1936). 351359
9
Arpad Steiner, The Date of Composition of Mandevilles Travels, Speculum, IX (1934). 144
147.
10
The version translated from the French is edited from a Cotton MS by P.Hamelius (2v, 191923;
EETS, 153154). Previous printed editions of Mandeville are all incomplete until that of A.W.Pollard
(in modern spelling, 1900). The Egerton MS, edited by Sir George Warner for the Roxburghe Club
(1889) with valuable apparatus, contains a composite text derived in part from one of the versions
from French and in part from the version based on the Latin translation. The original French is available
only in the Roxburghe volume noted above.
11
In the fourth part (now lost) of Jean dOutremeuses Myreur des Histoires a note recorded that
on Nov. 12, 1372 there died at Lige a man of distinguished birth who was content to be known as
Jean de Bourgogne, called with the beard. On his deathbed he revealed himself to Jean dOutremeuse
and made him his executor. In his will he called himself John de Mandeville, knight, count of Montfort
in England and lord of the Isle of Campdi and of the castle Prouse. However, having had the misfortune
in his country to kill a count who is not named, he undertook to traverse the three parts of the world,
coming to Lige in 1343. Having sprung from the nobility, he preferred to keep himself hidden. He
was moreover a great naturalist, profound philosopher and astrologer, adding to this an unusual
knowledge of physic, seldom being mistaken in a diagnosis. He was buried with the Guillemins. Now,
as a fact, there existed down to the French Revolution a tomb in the church of the Guillemins with an
epitaph several times independently copied down: Hie iacet nobilis Dominus Joannes de Montevilla
Miles, alias dictus ad Barbametc., recording that he was born in England, was of the medical
profession, and died Feb. 7, 1372. For other considerations complicating the problem the reader must be
Travels of
Sir John
Mandeville
268
Trevisa
theory of Hamelius 12 that the author was the Lige poet and chronicler Jean
dOutremeuse rests on rather slender grounds and as yet has not found many
adherents.
Less romantic but no less important is the work of John Trevisa. Born in
Cornwall, he entered Oxford in 1362, became a fellow of Queens College,
and for more than forty years was vicar of Berkeley and chaplain to three of
the Lords Berkeley. His most important translations were made at the command
of Thomas, Lord Berkeley, a true patron of learning. Trevisa died in 1402.13
Apart from his having translated the Bible, a matter still in dispute, his most
important works are his translations of Higdens Polychronicon,14 which he
finished in 1387, and of the De Proprietatibus Rerum of Bartholomew
Anglicus,15 completed in 1398. He is to be credited with the translation of a
rule of princes, De Regimine Principum, found in a single MS. Among his
shorter renderings are the Gospel of Nicodemus, the Dialogus inter Militem et
Clericum, a discussion of the secular power of the Church, and the Defensio
Curatorum, translated from a sermon of Richard FitzRalph, Archbishop of
Armagh, against the friars.16 Not the least interesting of Trevisas works are
two short, original essays on translation prefixed to the Polychronicon, the
first justifying translations into the vernacular, the second explaining his
method.17 Trevisa has been accused of wordiness, but his aim was above all to
be clear. His prose shows care and a certain amount of conscious artistry, looking
forward at times to the balance and alliteration of Euphuism.
Thomas Usks Testament of Love18 is better known than it deserves to
be, because borrowings from Piers Plowman and Chaucers Troilus make it
referred to E.B.Nicholson, John of Burgundy, alias Sir John Mandeville, Academy, XXV (1884).
2612; the article of Nicholson and Sir Henry Yule in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, eleventh ed.;
G.F.Warner in the DNB; and the discussions listed in the next note.
12
P.Hamelius, The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, Quar. Rev., CCXXVII (1917). 331352, and
the introduction to the EETS edition noted above.
13
The best account of Trevisas life is in Aaron J.Perrys introduction to three of Trevisas shorter
pieces edited for the EETS, 167 (1925). See also the same authors John Trevisa: A Fourteenth Century
Translator, Manitoba Essays (1937), pp. 277289.
14
See above, p. 148. Trevisas translation is edited in the Rolls Ser. (9V, 186586).
15
See above, p. 150. Trevisas translation has not been printed since 1582, but selections
(modernized) can be had in Robert Steele, Medival Lore from Bartholomew Anglicus (1893, and
later reprints).
16
The last two works and a doubtful translation from Methodius are edited by Perry, op. cit. A
translation of the De Re Militari of Vegetius, often attributed to Trevisa, must be given up. Cf. Perry,
p. xcvii (and see below, p. 301).
17
Conveniently reprinted in Alfred W.Pollard, Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse (1903), pp. 201
210.
18
Edited by W.W.Skeat, Chaucerian .and Other Pieces (Oxford, 1897; Oxford Chaucer, Vol. VII).
Usk was executed in 1388 after a checkered and seemingly none too honorable political career. Ramona
Bressie, The Date of Thomas Usks Testament of Love MP, XXVI (1928). 1729, attributes the
allegory to a period of imprisonment covering roughly the first six months of 1385. This seems a little
early to allow for the borrowings from Troilus and Criseyde. See also the same authors A Study of
Thomas Usks Testament of Love as an Autobiography, [Univ. of Chicago] Abstracts of Theses,
Humanistic Ser., VII. 517521. The third book has been traced to St. Anselms De Concordia
Praescientiae et Praedestinationis, of which it is in part a translation. See George Sanderlin, Usks
Testament of Love and St. Anselm, Speculum, XVII (1942). 6973.
269
useful in fixing the dates of these poems. It is a political allegory in prose,

written while the author was in prison. In it he treats the cause of his
imprisonment, justifies his conduct, and indicates that he should be released
and restored to favor. The allegory is full of obscurities which we can hardly
hope to clear up, but even if we could, no great service would be done to
English literature.
The most famous writer of English prose at the end of the fourteenth
century was John Wyclif,19 but it must be confessed that his importance rests
more upon his efforts toward social and ecclesiastical reform than on his
contributions to literature. Now that we believe he had very little hand in the
translation of the Bible that goes by his name, his position in the history of
English prose must be judged by his sermons and a number of tracts, expository
and controversial, the canon of which is not easy to determine.
Born, as is now thought, about 1328 at Wycliffe in the North Riding of
Yorkshire, he proceeded to Oxford about 1345 and gradually distinguished
himself so that by 1360 he had become Master of Balliol College. During
these years he received the usual strict training in scholasticism with its basis
in grammar and logic and its emphasis on Aristotle. After further years spent
in the study of theology he lectured on the Bible and the Sentences of Peter
Lombard, a standard textbook of the day. In 1361 he was appointed rector
of Fillingham, but resigned his charge in 1368 to accept one nearer Oxford,
at Ludgershall. Although he was given leaves to pursue his theological studies,
his academic career was prolonged and he did not receive his degree as Doctor
of Theology until 1372.
About this time he appears in the service of the king and we may think of
him as entering upon the second stage of his career. His opposition to the
papal claims on the Crown 20 recommended him to the government, and in
1374 he was rewarded with the rectory of Lutterworth, in Leicestershire,
which he held until his death. In this year he was sent to Bruges as a member
of a commission to negotiate with representatives of the pope. During the
next few years he stated his position at length in two Latin treatises, the De
Dominio Divino and De Civili Dominio, laying down the principle that all
temporal lordship is under the overlordship of God, that the condition on
which it may be exercised is righteousness, and that if this condition is
violated the unrighteous may be deprived of their property. He maintains
that the Church has no concern with temporal matters, that the clergy has no
right to hold property, and in any case that the civil authority may deprive it
of its property if unworthy of the trust. Such views, however acceptable to
the State, were bound to bring him into conflict with the rulers of the
Church.
As long as Wyclifs departures from orthodoxy were largely confined to
19
The best biography is Herbert B.Workman, John Wyclif: A Study of the English Medieval Church
(2V, Oxford, 1926).
20
In 1374 Gregory XI demanded the payment granted by King John in 1213 together with all
arrears.
Thomas
Usk:
Testament
of Love
Wyclif
His Life
270
His Condemnation
The Poor
Priests
His
Views
temporal matters he seems not only to have escaped official censure but to
have enjoyed a measure of political support. On occasion he was consulted
by the king. John of Gaunt, seeing that he might be useful, enlisted him in his
service. Consequently when Wyclif was attacked in 1377 by the Church and
arraigned before Courtenay, Bishop of London, and when Gregory XI
denounced his views and ordered his arrest, he was supported by John of
Gaunt and other members of the royal family and suffered only minor
inconveniences. But when he began about 1379 to attack such basic beliefs
of the Church as the doctrine of transubstantiation he alienated many of his
previous supporters, including John of Gaunt. In 1380 he was publicly
condemned by a committee of twelve Oxford scholars, and shortly afterwards
he left Oxford for good.
The rest of his life, which may be thought of as the third and last phase of
his career, was spent at his parish in Lutterworth. There, impaired in health,
he continued to defend his views while he gathered together and edited his
sermons, organized his writings into an elaborate Summa, and directed the
flock of poor priests who were spreading his ideas over many parts of
England. In 1382 Courtenay, now archbishop, called a council of forty-four
bishops, doctors of theology, and others on whose support he could count
the Blackfriars Synodand obtained a sweeping condemnation of Wyclifite
views. But though Wyclifs followers were hunted down, punished, and forced
to recant, Wyclif remained unmolested in his Lutterworth parsonage.
Courtenay evidently knew when to stop. During his two remaining years
Wyclif suffered a partial paralysis, the result of a stroke. His death occurred
on the last day of the year 1384.
It is not a part of our purpose to discuss here in detail Wyclifs views as
set forth most fully in his many Latin writings. Such a discussion belongs
to political and social history rather than to literature. We have already
mentioned his theory of dominion as presented in two basic works about
13756.21 Equally basic is his insistence on the absolute authority of the
Bible.22 Gregory XIs condemnation led him to an examination of the
constitution and claims of the Church,23 which he followed with a similar
consideration of the office of the king 24 and the authority of the pope.25
He felt that material possessions had made the Church worldly. He there
21
The DC Dominio Divino and De Civili Dominio, like most of Wyclifs Latin writings, have been
published by the Wyclif Society.
22
De Veritate Sacrae Scripturae (1378).
23
De Ecclesia (finished late in 1378) asserts that the exercise of religious functions by ecclesiastics
depends on their worthiness. He condemns indulgences by the pope, trentals, prayers for the dead, and
the like, rejects the cult of the saints, and opposes (more mildly than in his later writings) relics and
pilgrimages.
24
De Officio Regis (1378) really concerns the question of Church and State. The king is Gods
viear and therefore must rule wisely and justly. He has jurisdiction over the clergy, should see that the
clergy perform their functions in a worthy manner, and he is not bound to obey the pope.
25
De Potestate Papae (1379) asserts that the primacy of the pope depends upon character (sanctity)
and that he is not necessarily St. Peters successor. It questions the right of the Romans to determine
the succession. The De Ordine Christiano is a brief statement of the same position.
271
fore urged the king to take back the endowments of the Church and restore
the clergy to their original poverty. He opposed both the employment of
ecclesiastics in secular office and the life of monastic retirement which too
often fell away from the spiritual ideal. The function of the clergy, in his
opinion, was to minister to the people. For this reason he was at the beginning
more sympathetic to the friars, but in the end he found them wanting and
attacked them bitterly.
Wyclifs English writings are not always easy to separate from those of his
followers.26 His sermons, which fill two volumes, are for the most part to be
accepted as his, but they are generally only two or three pages long and were
probably prepared for the guidance of his poor priests. Many of his English
treatises represent translations and abridgments of his Latin works, and some
of these may have been prepared by his followers. Among those that can be
attributed to Wyclif himself, some are treatments such as we find elsewhere
of the Ten Commandments, The Seven Deadly Sins, and the Seven Works of
Mercy. More interesting are the De Papa and The Church and Her Members
in which he puts into English the views already put forward in Latin concerning
the authority of the pope, the objection to monastic orders, the lapses of the
friars, disendowment, and the like. Two of his English treatises are especially
interesting because they deal with social questions and are not adaptations of
Latin works. Of Servants and Lords was inspired by the Peasants Revolt. It
is a very moderate treatment, insisting on the duty servants owe to their lord
as well as the obligation of lords, but discussing in plain terms the many
ways in which the poor are wronged. Wedded Men and Wives offers
wholesome advice on marriage and the rearing of children. Virginity is a
higher state than matrimony, but matrimony is holy. He is not at all sure that
celibacy is a wise requirement for the priesthood. The whole treatise is a
compound of biblical precept and good common sense.
The so-called Wyclif Bible 27 appears to owe little more to Wyclif than
the impulse behind it. It was apparently the work of his companions and
helpers. Nicholas of Hereford translated about three-fourths of the Old
Testament, as we learn from a note in one of the manuscripts. The style is
awkward and anything but idiomatic and does not agree with any of me
translations which Wyclif gives in his sermons. Apparently it was early felt
to be unsatisfactory, and perhaps even before Wyclifs death a revision was
undertaken by John Purvey,28 who assisted Wyclif in his last days at
Lutterworth. Although Purvey was aided, as he says, by many good fellows
and cunning, his revision was not completed until about 1395. It is in
every way superior to the early version. Not a little of the sentence structure and
26
The principal collections are Thomas Arnold, Select English Worlds of John Wyclif (3V, Oxford,
186971), which contains many pieces now rejected from the Wyclif canon, and F.D. Matthew, The
English Works of Wyclif Hitherto Unprinted (1880; EETS, 74), which likewise includes some doubtful
works. A convenient small volume is Herbert E.Winn, Wyclif: Select English Writings (1929).
27
Edited by J.Forshall and Sir F.Madden (4v, Oxford, 1850).
28
Purveys part in the translation rests on strong evidence, just short of proof.
His
English
Writings
The
Wyclif
Bible
272
an occasional fine phrase have been carried over into the Authorized Version
of 1611.
Even though Wyclif may have had no part at all in the actual work of
translation, the important step of putting the whole Bible into English for the
first time was the result of his attitude toward the Scriptures as the ultimate
authority in all questions concerning mans moral and spiritual life. He believed
it was the right of simple men to turn to the Bible for the points that be most
needful to salvation. Simple piety was worth more than forms and ritual.
His poor priests resembled the early friars in seeking to bring religion home
to the common man. Coming from the north where we have seen that so
many of the religious movements of the fourteenth century had their beginning,
Wyclif sought in a different way what Rolle and the mystics were seeking
to bring a more direct and personal meaning into religious life.29
29
Exemplifying Wyclifs purpose to bring religious instruction to the poor is an anonymous treatise
of the late fourteenth century called Pore Caitiff. It is found in a large number of MSS, but has been
printed only in modernized form and in selections. In addition to treatments of the Paternoster, Creed,
etc., it discusses patience, temptation, and other subjects for poor mens spiritual profit. Extracts have
been printed in R.Vaughans Life of Wycliffe (1852), pp. 382 ff. See also M.T.Brady, The Pore Caitif:
An Introductory Study, Traditio, X (1954). 529548.
XIX
The Beginnings of the Drama
Mimicry and make-believe are well nigh universal human impulses and drama
has therefore developed independently at various times and places in the
worlds history. Among the Greeks it attained high distinction. Among the
Romans it was less popular. Conditions in the Roman Empire were politically
disturbed, and the populace preferred to shout and cheer at the chariot races
and gladiatorial combats of the circus and amphitheatre rather than quietly
watch a play. The theatre apparently did not attract the best literary talents
in Italy. Plautus and Terence are not comparable to Virgil, Horace, or Livy in
other forms of literature, and Senecas tragedies were closet dramas. The
most popular theatrical entertainments were the performances of mimes1 in
which coarse humor and indecency combined to secure at times the attention
of the vulgar. The hordes of barbarians pouring into Rome did not help
matters. Drama had apparently never developed among the Teutons, and
witty dialogue was wasted on the speakers of an unfamiliar tongue. With the
rise of Christianity the theatre ran into other difficulties. The Church objected
to its associations with paganism, to the fact that in its lower forms it often
ridiculed the new religion, and perhaps most of all to the immorality of both
performances and performers. With the fall of the Empire, Roman drama
disappeared, and for five hundred years only a faint dramatic tradition may
have survived, passed on from the mimes to the medieval minstrel.
It is ironical that the Church, the force that had done most to drive
Roman drama out of existence, should have been the institution in which
modern drama was to take its rise. For the drama of the Middle Ages is not
a continuation of Roman drama but a development from entirely new
beginnings in the services of the Church,2 first in the more solemn service of
the Mass and later in the less rigid office of Matins. Theoretically no
departure from the text of the missal was permitted in the celebration of
Mass, but actually intrusions crept in, at first in the form of musical
embellishments at the end of the gradual, to which words were in time added,3
1
See H.Reich, Der Mimus (2v, Berlin, 1903).

The authoritative work on the liturgical drama is Karl Young, The Drama of the Medieval Church
(2V, Oxford, 1933), where full references to previous literature are given. For the background of the
drama in folk custom and a general survey of dramatic developments see E.K.Chambers, The Medieval
Stage (2V, Oxford, 1903).
3
The gradual is a chant sung after the epistle of the day, and closes with alleluia. The name sequence
was at first applied to the melody in which the final a of alleluia was prolonged. Later words were
fitted to such melodies and the term sequence designated both the words and music. Additions to other
parts of the service are called tropes. For the distinction and for the development of tropes see
2
273
Disappearance of
Roman
Drama
Beginnings
of Modern
Drama in
the Church
274
The
Quem
quaeritis
and later through amplifications woven into various other chants. The latter
are called tropes, and it is with a trope in the Mass of Easter that we are most
concerned.
The Introit or opening chant began with the words Resurrexi et adhuc
tecum sum. At about the year 900 we find it prefaced by a trope which the
following slightly normalized text exemplifies in its simplest form:
Quem quaeritis in sepulchro, o Christicolae?
Jesum Nazarenum crucifixum, o caelicolae.
Non est hic; surrexit sicut praedixerat;
ite, nuntiate quia surrexit de sepulchro.4
Development of
This Trope
These lines are a paraphrase of the dialogue between the angel and the Marys
at the tomb of Christ as implied in the Gospel of St. Matthew. As sung
antiphonallyi.e., alternately by the two halves of the choirthey constitute
merely a dialogued chant. They never became much more as long as they
were attached to the Mass. But they are of great importance, for they are the
germ out of which modern drama grew.
The development of this trope in the Mass never went far enough to be
embarrassing to the service, and indeed it could not have grown much without
becoming so. The words, however, were equally appropriate to the office of
Matins a little earlier in the day, a service with which the Elevatio Crucis was
in many places associated. When transferred to the end of this office the
Quem quaeritis underwent a gradual change. Two members of the choir,
robed in white to suggest angels, took positions beside the altar, while three
others in black represented the Marys. This simple but momentous change5
introduced the element of impersonation and the result was a miniature opera.
Slowly other lines were added. Who will roll away for us the stone? the
Marys ask, approaching the supposed sepulcher. The angels, after announcing
the Resurrection, invite the Marys to Come and see the place where the Lord
was laid, which they do, and then hold up the linens with suitable words.
When the angels bid them carry the news to the disciples they do so, and in
some places Peter and John race to the sepulcher (cf. John, 2014). In certain
texts the episode in which Christ appears to Mary Magdalene (cf. John, 20:11
18) occurs. When all of these amplifications are present we have a sizable
and highly dramatic ceremony.
So successful an innovation was soon imitated, and a similar ceremony
was introduced at Christmas. By a slight change in wording the dialogue
C.Blume, introduction to Analecta Hymnica, LIII, and L.Gautier, Histoire de la posie liturgique au
moyen ge: les tropes (Paris, 1886).
4
Whom seek ye in the sepulchre, O Christians?

Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified, O angels.
He is not here; he has arisen as he foretold;
go, announce that he has arisen from the grave.
The fullest collection of Quem quaeritis texts is in Carl Lange, Die lateinischen Osterfeiern (Munich, 1887).
5
It occurs in a few texts of the Introit trope. In time temporary or permanent structures known as
Easter sepulchers were constructed for the ceremony.
THE BEGINNINGS OF THE DRAMA
275
between the angels and the Marys could be adapted to the shepherds who
came to adore the Christ-child. Obstetrices or midwives replace the angels as
interlocutors, and the result is:
Quem quaeritis in praesepe, o pastures, dicite.
Salvatorem Christum Dominum, infantem pannis
involutum, secundum sermonem angelicum.
Adest hic parvulus cum Maria matre sua.
Et nunc euntes dicite quia natus est.6
Such a conversation though plausible, is lacking in any biblical authority,
differing in this respect from the words spoken at the tomb. It is quite obviously
an imitation of the Easter trope, and is known as the Officium Pastorum.
The simple little act of worship performed by the shepherds offered only
limited possibilities for dramatic development. More productive were certain
other ceremonies of the Christmas season. On Twelfth Day was celebrated
the coming of the Magi, not only to adore but to bring rich gifts. As kings
they were impressive in their costumes of Oriental splendor, but more
important was the fact that they had to pass through the kingdom of Herod
and be questioned concerning the new-born king whom they were seeking.
Herod soon becomes the central figure in the action. Surrounded by a
considerable retinue of courtiers, scribes, messengers, and soldiers, he
symbolizes the tyrants power jealous of any threat to its supremacy. He
dislikes what the Magi tell him, sends for his learned men, is unwillingly
convinced that their book contains disturbing prophecies, and in one text
throws the book down in a rage. We have thus early the model for the ranting
Herod of later drama.7 From the fact that a star suspended from the roof of
the church guided the Magi on their journey the ceremony here described is
known as the Officium Stellae, the Office of the Star.8
Two other developments took place at the Christmas season. One was a
natural extension of the Stella, showing the slaughter of the innocents by
Herods soldiers. The children are slain and Rachel, representative of the
grieving mothers of Israel, sings her lament in a little duet with conventional
consolatrices. From the latter circumstance the episode is known as the
Ordo Rachelis. The other was the Ordo Prophetarum, a ceremony of some
interest since it originated not in a chant of the choir but in a sermon.9 In
6
Whom seek ye in the manger, O shepherds, tell us.

Christ our Lord the Savior, an infant wrapped in
swaddling clothes, as the angels say.
Here is the little one with Mary, his mother.
And now go and say that he is born.
Cf. Hamlet, III. ii. 16.

In addition to Karl Young, as above, see Heinrich Anz, Die lateinischen Magierspiele (Leipzig,
1905).
9
The development from sermon to dramatic ceremony was first studied by M.Sepet, Les Prophtes
du Christ (Paris, 1878; also published in installments scattered through the Bibliothque de lEcole des
Chartres, Vols, XXVIII, XXIX, and XXXVIII), the basic treatment. Karl Young corrects Sepet in detail
and adds important texts in his Ordo Prophetarum, Trans. Wisconsin Acad., XX (1921). 182, and
in his Drama of the Medieval Church, ch. XXI. A translation of the pertinent portions of the
8
Officium
Pastorum
Officium
Stellae
Ordo
Rachelis
and
Ordo
Prophetarum
276
From
Church
to Craft
Realism
and
Humor
the Middle Ages an attempt to convince unbelievers out of their own mouths,
wrongly attributed to St. Augustine and entitled Contra Judaeos, Paganos, et
Arianos, was frequently read as a lectio in the Christmas Matins. In one
section of this sermon various Old Testament prophetsIsaiah, Jeremiah,
Daniel, etc.are called upon by the preacher to testify to the coming of
Christ. When their words are not merely reported but delivered by separate
personages appropriately costumed the sermon becomes elementary drama.
In time episodes connected with some of the prophets, such as Nebuchadnezzar
and Balaam, were represented. It has been claimed that from such episodes
sprang the treatment of Old Testament subjects in medieval drama. While
this may be doubted, it is apparent that once the impulse towards dramatic
representation was abroad, a sermon or any other suitable material could
become the stuff out of which drama was made.
The amalgamation and elaboration of such dramatic ceremonies within
the church in time put a strain upon the services. And what is more,
additional episodes tended to develop, if not actually in the office, at least
in a transitional stage ending in separation from the church. The birth of
Christ, for example, called for some explanation. If Adam and Eve had not
fallen, man would not have been in need of redemption. A scene was needed
showing the temptation of Eve by Satan in the Garden of Eden. But why
did Satan tempt Eve? Out of malice for having been driven out of Heaven.
Why was he driven out of Heaven? That also must be told. Finally, the evil
brought to the world by mans disobedience can be symbolized by the slaying
of Abel by Cain. Such an extension of theme is illustrated in the twelfthcentury Anglo-Norman Adam, which consists of a long episode, running to
nearly 600 lines, on the Fall and Expulsion from Paradise, a shorter treatment
of Cain and Abel, and a Prophets play, incomplete.10 The same episodes
sometimes served as an equally suitable introduction to the drama of Easter.
Not only would such an extensive action take up much time and interfere
with the service proper, but it would tax the resources of the clergy. In
some places it was necessary to call in outsiders of good and
discreet character to assist in the performance. Realistic elements verging
on the humorous crept in. Balaam delivered his prophecy after a little
by-play in which he beat his ass and the faithful beast brayed touchingly.
In one text Mary Magdalene is shown with her lover, singing a profane
song and buying aids to her complexion, before being converted and
exchanging the cosmetics for ointment. Such incidents are inappropriate to
the solemn ritual of the church. Adequate space for settings and accommo
sermon has been published by Edward N.Stone in the Univ. of Wash. Pub. in Lang. and Lit., Vol. IV.
No. 3 (1928).
10
The play is mostly in French with a few liturgical elements in Latin. The stage directions, also in
Latin, are remarkably detailed with respect to action, costume, and setting. The most satisfactory
edition is that of Paul C.Studer (Manchester, 1918). The play has been twice translated into English:
(I) by Sarah F.Barrow and Wm. H.Hulme in Western Reserve Univ. Bull., Vol. XXVIII, No. 8 (1925);
(2) by Edward N.Stone in Univ. of Wash. Pub. in Lang. and Lit., IV (1926). 159193.
277
dation for the crowds that would want to witness the performances raised
other difficulties. And so from choir to nave, and nave to church-porch were
natural steps on the way to the public square. Once outside the church the
performances gradually broke their liturgical bonds. Latin, the liturgical
language, gave way to the vernacular.11 At the same time the musical rendering
yielded to the more realistic spoken word. We must suppose that the laity
now participated to an increasing extent while the clergy more and more
withdrew until the plays ended up entirely in the hands of the people.
The transition here sketched may be accepted with some confidence in
its main outlines, but it must be admitted that we are far from clear about
many of its details. While the drama is growing up within the church we
can trace its development with fair continuity, although we would gladly
know more about the genesis of some of its later and more elaborate texts.
When we turn to the large vernacular cycles it is as though something in
between had dropped out. For example, we can observe the tendency, already
described, for the episodes of liturgical drama to collect in sequences, but
there is no sequence of episodes in liturgical drama comparable in scope to
the great mystery cycles. At one stage we see the drama in the process of
passing out of the church and the control of the clergy. We next see it in the
hands of the craft guilds or mysteries and in the control of the civic
authorities. The intermediate steps are missing. A factor of considerable
importance was probably the establishment in England of the festival of
Corpus Christi, but its influence has yet to be defined.12 We know that
Corpus Christi day13 was generally observed in England from 1318 on, and
that by papal decree a procession with five (nondramatic) pageants
constituted a major feature of the observance. The pageants or tableaux
suggested the need for Corpus Christi by portraying the Fall of Man, then
the prophecies, the coming, and the death of Christ, and finally the triumph
of Corpus Christi in the Judgment Day. With many additional details this
constitutes the subject matter of the mystery cycles, and since Corpus Christi
day came to be the most popular date in England for the performance of
mystery cycles, it is likely that in scope, time of performance, and the use of
movable pageant wagons the mystery cycles owe something to the Corpus
Christi procession. One may put it another way by saying that the religious
plays, emerging from the church took the form in which we know them
under the inspiration of the Corpus Christi festival. It is perhaps significant
11
The transition can be seen in certain texts from England, France, and Germany in which the
words of a speech are first sung in Latin and then spoken in the vernacular. In England this stage is
illustrated by the Shrewsbury fragments, conveniently available in Adams, Chief Pre-Shakespearean
Dramas (Boston, 1924), pp. 7378.
12
For a discussion of the problem see Hardin Craig, The Corpus Christi Procession and the
Corpus Christi Play, JEGP, XIII (1914). 589602, and M. Pierson, The Relation of the Corpus
Christi Procession to the Corpus Christi Play in England, Trans. Wise. Acad., XVIII (1915). 110
165.
13
Corpus Christi day is the Thursday following Trinity Sunday, i.e., a little more than eight weeks
after Easter. It falls generally at the end of May or early in June, an ideal time for outdoor performances.
Mystery
Cycles
Corpus
Christi
Day
278
The
Craft
Guilds
Records
of Cycles
that the second quarter of the fourteenth century seems to have been the
period in which they were taking shape.
In spite of their religious content and their association with the festival of
Corpus Christi it is important to stress the civic character of the English religious
cycles. Where the cycles attained significant size and were performed regularly
every year it was because the governing body of the city considered them an
asset to be maintained and promoted, just as countless chambers of commerce
today seek conventions and promote fairs or other activities that attract visitors
and augment local prestige. In the beginning the various pageants must have
been distributed to the guilds by mutual agreement or on the decision of the
central authority; otherwise it is unlikely that we should find so many crafts
giving plays especially appropriate to them.14 As we read the records of a city
like York15 we see the city council regulating the performances, settling disputes
between guilds, imposing fines, reassigning plays, and exercising many other
sorts of control. At first the attitude of the guilds is one of pride in performance,
and there is rivalry in getting possession of a pageant. Later the plays become
a duty, often burdensome upon crafts whose prosperity had declined. But while
the burden is sometimes shifted or shared by another guild, the attitude of the
city fathers is always that the plays must go on.
Cycles of mystery plays16 seem to have been a regular feature only in some
of the larger towns. Other places were content with an occasional episode, a
saints play, or a performance by a visiting troupe. The evidence for the existence
of a cycle is clear for only about a dozen places in England. Of these, London
alone is in the south and the few mentions of its plays suggest occasional
performances by the parish clerks and not the guilds. The important centers
were in the north and the MidlandsYork, Wakefield, Beverley, Newcastleupon-Tyne, Norwich, Coventry, and Chester. The performance was not in all
cases on Corpus Christi day, but this was the most usual practice. Naturally
the size and scope of the cycles varied greatly in different localities and sometimes
at different dates. The York cycle at the height of its development contained
as many as fifty-seven pageants. At the other end of the scale stood Worcester,
which never seems to have had more than five. Of all this religious drama we
are fortunate in having a considerable part preserved. It is rather remarkable
that the only important cycle of which no fragment remains seems to be that
of Beverley, which contained thirty-eight plays. We have two of the Coventry
plays and one each from Norwich and Newcastle; all three of these cycles originally
consisted of about a dozen plays.17 We also have preserved two isolated plays
14
At Newcastle the Noah play was assigned to the shipwrights and other watermen, the Magi to
the goldsmiths, the Disputation in the Temple to the lawyers, the Flight into Egypt to the stable keepers,
the Last Supper to the bakers, etc. It was so elsewhere.
15
For example, the York Memorandum Book, ed. Maude Sellers (2V, Durham, 191215; Surtees
Soc., 120, 125).
16
On the English cycles see E.K.Chambers, as above, and Charles M.Gayley, Plays of Our Forefathers
(1907).
17
Newcastle may have been slightly larger, but the evidence is not unequivocal. The Coventry cycle
almost certainly contained ten plays. The best edition of the extant Coventry plays is that of Hardin Craig,
279
of Abraham and Isaac which we cannot localize. They may be fragments of

otherwise lost cycles or they may always have been independent. The same
may be said of three items in the Digby MS. Of the cycles preserved in full,
those of York, Wakefield, and Chester, and the misnamed Ludus Coventriae,
we shall speak more at length. When we consider that we have a cycle in
Cornish which we can use for purposes of comparison we must conclude
that time has dealt rather gently with us in the matter of the old English
mystery plays, and avoid the mistake of supposing that much of major
importance has disappeared without leaving some trace behind.
The most extensive English cycle of which we know was that of York.18 In
the form in which it has come down to us it consists of forty-eight plays, but
the MS dates from about 1475 and the cycle was at one time longer. The
plays are first referred to in 1378 and then they are spoken of as of old
time. They cover very fully the whole of biblical history. They begin with
the creation of the world and pass successively through the expulsion from
Paradise, the killing of Abel, the story of Noah and the flood, of Abraham
and Isaac, and of the Israelites. in Egypt. In all, eleven plays are devoted to
Old Testament matter. Then come the Annunciation and visit to Elizabeth,
and the birth of Jesus with the familiar episodes of the shepherds and the
Magi up to the slaughter of the innocents. With Play XX we take up the life
of Christhis dispute with the doctors in the temple, his Baptism, Temptation,
Transfiguration, encounter with the woman taken in adultery, his raising of
Lazarus, and finally his entry into Jerusalem. With the events leading to the
Crucifixion the treatment becomes unusually full. Sixteen plays tell the story
from the conspiracy to take Jesus, the Last Supper through the accusation
and trial, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, on to the journey to Emmaus
and the incredulity of Thomas. The last few pageants portray Christs
Ascension, the death of Mary, her appearance to Thomas, and her Assumption.
The whole concludes with the Judgment Day. Allowing for individual
omissions and modifications, this may be taken as typical of the scope of the
English cycles. It must not be supposed that the York plays reached such a
degree of elaboration in one creative effort. It is likely that the original cycle
was much smaller. There are evidences that it underwent major revision at
two different times, and it is likely that subdivision, amalgamation, and
alteration frequently occurred in individual plays as occasion arose. The cycle
was not static, but subject to improvement and frequent modification to adapt
it to changing conditions among the crafts that produced it. This will account
for the great variations in tone, effectiveness, versification, and humor in its
different parts.
On the whole it is a dignified and impressive production. Only rarely,
as in the case of the Annunciation, is the action undramatic, and in certain
Two Coventry Corpus Christi Plays (London, 1902; EETSES, 87). The Norwich and Newcastle fragments
will be found in O.Waterhouse, The Non-Cycle Mystery Plays (London, 1909; EETSES, 104). The Digby
Plays were edited by F.J.Furnivall (London, 1896; EETSES, 70).
18
York Plays, ed. Lucy Toulmin Smith (Oxford, 1885).
The York
Plays
280
The
Towneley
Plays
episodes it is highly realistic and vigorous. Homely humor enlivens the play
of Noah and the flood, in which Noahs wife demurs about entering the ark
and prefers to go to town. When she finally yields to persuasion she saves
face by complaining that Noah might have told her earlier of his plans, and
she expresses her annoyance by giving him a clout over the head. In the play
of the shepherds there is much excitement over the appearance of the star,
voiced in exclamations of Wow! and Golly! There is an attempt to
differentiate the shepherds. The Second Shepherd thinks the others have
something to eat and comes up eagerly. Their gifts are not without a
suggestion of amusing simplicity. The First Shepherd presents a brooch hung
with a little tin bell and the Second offers two cobb-nuts on a ribbon. Both,
simple souls that they were, navely express the wish that the new-born King
will remember them when he comes into power. The Third Shepherd, on the
other hand, offers somewhat apologetically a horn spoon that holds forty
peas, and in his simple piety asks no reward. Realism of another kind
accompanies the Crucifixion. The four soldiers, as they nail Jesus to the
cross, find the cross too large and while they pull and stretch they make
comments that are almost too realistic. Again, as they carry the cross up the
hill they make much of its weight. One of them must set it down or his back
will break; another is out of breath. Finally they set the cross in the mortise
and accompany the driving in of the wedges with taunting remarks. While in
such scenes we may question the dramatists taste, we cannot deny them
vigor and a lively dramatic sense.
Some forty miles southwest of York lies the town of Wakefield, to which
with most probability the cycle known as the Towneley Plays19 is to be
assigned. Originally rather small, Wakefield experienced rapid growth in the
fifteenth century when heavy taxes in York drove many engaged in the woolen
industry to other nearby centers.20 This circumstance may account for the
close relation of the Towneley cycle with the York Plays which we shall notice
shortly. The cycle is only slightly shorter than that of York. The extant
MS, which has lost at least two plays, contains thirty-two pageants
treating a range of subjects similar to that indicated in the description
of the York cycle. It is even more composite. Three stages are recognized
by which it attained its present form. Beginning as a group of plays of
simple religious tone, it took over early in the fifteenth century five plays,
19
So called from the circumstance that the MS (dated c. 1460) was long preserved at Towneley
Hall in Lancashire. It is now in the Huntington Library in California. The latest edition is that of
George England and Alfred W.Pollard (London, 1897; EETEES, 71).
20
See Herbert Heaton, The Yorkshire Woollen and Worsted Industries (Oxford, 1920). There is
some doubt whether Wakefield had a sufficient number of guilds to produce a cycle as extensive as the
Towneley Plays. Unfortunately medieval records of Wakefield have almost completely disappeared. It
has recently been shown, however, that there were Corpus Christi plays there in 1533 (LTLS, March 5,
1925, p. 156). It would seem that Wakefield reached its height as a woolen center some time in the first
half of the fifteenth century, after which its woolen trade was on the decline. This would correspond
with the period at which on other grounds we know that the Towneley cycle was being expanded and
revised. The association of the cycle with Wakefield rests upon a number of clear local allusions in
some of the plays.
281
and possibly more, from the York cycle.21 Other plays showing York influence
were conceivably revised or composed at the same time. Finally in the reign
of Henry VI22 and probably in the second quarter of the fifteenth century a
writer of great dramatic gifts contributed a number of plays, mostly in a
distinctive nine-line stanza, and touched up several others. It is the work of
this man that gives the Towneley Plays their special distinction in early English
drama, and in our ignorance of his name and identity we refer to him justly
as the Wakefield master.
The work of the Wakefield master is unique in medieval drama. Nowhere
else do we find such a combination of what we call nowadays good theatre
with boisterous humor and exuberance of spirit. Satirical sallies and farcical
situations burst forth without regard to propriety or convention. In the Murder
of Abel this medieval Aristophanes introduces a scene of rough humor in
which Cain and Garcio abuse each other, and he makes Cain boldly rebellious
toward God, who, he says, has given him only sorrow and woe. To so solemn
a play as the Doomsday he contributes two broadly humorous scenes. The
devils carry on a lively dialogue alluding to the unusual amount of evidence
they have against women and remark that if the Judgment Day had not come
when it did they would have had to make Hell larger. Nowhere does his
ability appear, however, to better effect than in the Second Shepherds Play.23
As a prelude to the adoration he tells the story of Mak, a notorious sheepstealer, and his attempt to steal a sheep from the shepherds by concealing it in
a cradle and pretending that it is a baby to which his wife has just given birth.
The theme is a folk-tale24 worked up through successive moments of dramatic
suspense to a climax in which the culprits guilt is dramatically revealed.
There is humor of situation and humor of dialogue and incidental allusion
jibes at shrewish wives and crying children, taxes and the poor mans lot.
The length of the Mak episode is hopelessly out of proportion to the proper
matter of the play. The Second Shepherds Play as a shepherds play is an
artistic absurdity; as a farce of Mak the sheep-stealer it is the masterpiece of
the English religious drama.25
Not so much can be said for the third great English cycle which we
can definitely localize. The Chester Plays 26 are rather lacking in dramatic
21
Miss Marie C.Lyle has argued that these plays are the residue of a parent cycle from which both
York and Towneley descend. Cf. The Original Identity of the York and Towneley Cycles (Minneapolis,
1919; Research Pub. of the Univ. of Minn. Vol. VIII, No. 3).
22
See Mendal G.Frampton, The Date of the Flourishing of the Wakefield Master, PMLA, L
(1935). 631660.
23
There are two (alternate) plays of the shepherds in the cycle, both by the Wakefield genius. The
first, however, is overshadowed by the second.
24
See A.S.Cook, Another Parallel to the Mak Story, MP, XIV (1916). 1115; A.C. Baugh, The
Mak Story, MP, XV (1918). 729734; B.J.Whiting, An Analogue to the Mak Story, Speculum, VII
(1932). 552; Robert C.Cosbey, The Mak Story and Its Folklore Analogues, Speculum, XX (1945).
310317.
25
On the work of the Wakefield master see Millicent Carey, The Wakefield Group in the Towneley
Cycle (Baltimore and Gttingen, 1930; Hesperia, Ergnzungsreihe, XI).
26
Ed. Hermann Deimling and Dr. Matthews (2V, 18931916; EETSES, 62, 115).
The
Wakefield
Master
The
Chester
Plays
282
The
Ludus
Coventriae
quality. As a cycle they are much more of one texture than the York or
Towneley plays and that texture is narrative rather than dramatic. This
uniformity is the more remarkable when we consider that the plays were
performed occasionally as late as 1575.27 In the sixteenth century they had
become the object of antiquarian interest: no less than four extant MSS were
copied out between 1591 and 1607, and various traditions concerning their
origin were recorded. One of these traditions credits the composition of the
cycle to Ranulf Higden in 1328. Higden was a monk of Chester abbey, well
known as the author of the Polychronicon (cf. p. 148). There is nothing
improbable in this attribution. The character of the plays is quite in keeping
with what we might expect from such an author. Whoever wrote them
originally was a man of cosmopolitan taste, learned but not deep, scholarly
rather than popular, with little or no humor and slight ability to project
himself into his characters. He may have been familiar with the way similar
religious cycles were drawn up in France, for in the curtailed character of the
Old Testament matter and in certain features of the treatment the Chester
Plays resemble the French mystres rather than the other English cycles.28
The last of the four extant cycles presents a number of problems. In the
seventeenth century it was wrongly identified with the plays for which
Coventry was famous, and the name then attached to the MS has caused it
ever since to be known as the Ludus Coventriae.29 The one thing that we can
be surest of about this collection is that it has nothing to do with Coventry.
Apart from the fact that the two genuine Coventry plays that have been
preserved show no resemblance to the corresponding episodes in the Ludus
Coventriae, we know that the Coventry plays were given on Corpus Christi
day (a Thursday) whereas the Ludus Coventriae, as we learn from the Banns
or Proclamation, was performed on Sunday. From allusions in the text we
also know that the plays were given in installments, successive groups being
given in successive years. Finally the Proclamation, in advertising the
performance, announces that it will be given in N. towne. This was
formerly taken to designate some town whose name began with N, but the N
is more likely to stand for the Latin word nomen and to indicate
performance by a traveling company which would thus be free to insert any
desired name in the announcement at this point. The Ludus Coventriae is
interesting in many ways, but it is less significant dramatically than the other
cycles.
Except for the Ludus Coventriae the extant English cycles seem all to
27
On the development of the cycle see a valuable study by F.M.Salter, The Banns of the Chester
Plays, RES, XV (1939). 432457; XVI (1940). 117, 137148, and the joint publication of Salter and
W.W.Greg, The Trial & Flagellation with Other Studies in the Chester Cycle (1935; Malone Soc. Studies).
28
Albert C.Baugh, The Chester Plays and French Influence, Schelling Anniversary Papers (1923),
pp. 3563.
29
Ludus Coventriae, ed. K.S.Block (1922; EETSES, 120). See also a brilliant essay by W.W.Greg in
his Bibliographical and Textual Problems of the English Miracle Cycles (1914), pp. 108143.
283
have been given in a manner peculiar to England.30 Each episode was

performed on a separate stage set on wheels so that it could be drawn from
point to point in the city. The stations were designated in advance. At one
time there were as many as fourteen in York and each episode in the cycle
had to be repeated fourteen times. Fortunately for the actors, a smaller number
generally sufficed. Where the entire cycle was given in one day it was necessary
to begin earlyat six oclock in the morning or even earlier. But the crowd
was in a holiday mood, pageant wagons and streets were gay with flags and
bunting, and the occasion must have been one of the memorable events of
the year for many a citizen who lived within reach of a town that boasted of
a cycle of Corpus Christi plays.
It must not be supposed that communities less fortunate were without any
form of dramatic entertainment. Isolated plays are common enough in the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, though in most cases only the records of
their performance have survived. Popular Bible stories such as that of Noah
or of Abraham and Isaac were sometimes given by themselves, and many a
saint was celebrated in a dramatic representation of his life or martyrdom.
Indeed, once the drama is established as a literary form, almost any subject
of religious or doctrinal significance might be made into a play. We have a
play of Mary Magdalene, in which elements of the morality play, which we
shall turn to in a moment, are combined with the miracle of her conversion.
The Croxton Play of the Sacrament dramatizes a widespread story of the
torture of the sacred Host by Jews. At York as early as 1378 there was a
Paternoster Play, and in the fifteenth century a Creed Play was sometimes
performed in place of the Corpus Christi cycle. The last two have not come
down to us. We would gladly know more about them since they may well
have been transitional types to the morality play. Clearly there is a tendency
to go outside the range of Bible story in the search for variety, and such a
search finds its most characteristic expression in the type just mentioned and
to which we now turn.
It is not easy to define simply the morality play. From the point of view
of the dramatis personae the morality differs from previous drama in
dealing with personifications of abstract qualities such as Beauty, Strength,
Gluttony, and Peace, or with generalized classes such as Everyman, King,
and Bishop. But not all plays concerning such characters are morality
plays. In its true form the morality is distinguished by certain characteristic
themes treated allegorically. These include such subjects as the summons
of Death, the conflict of vices and virtues for supremacy in mans life, and
the question of his ultimate fate as debated by the Four Daughters of
God. They all seem to center in the problem of mans salvation and the
conduct of life as it affects his salvation. The morality is also characterized
by a definite purpose or object which it seeks to promote. Whereas the mystery
plays were to bring the important facts of the Bible vividly home to the average
30
Much useful information on the method of performance is gathered together in M, Lyle Spencer,
Corpus Christi Pageants in England (1911).
Method of
Performance
Non-Cycle
Plays
The
Morality
Play
284
Its
Origin
The Pride
of Life
man, the morality teaches a lesson about right livingpreaches a sermon in

dramatic form. We may combine these considerations into a definition by
saying that the morality play presents allegorically some object lesson or
warning by means of abstract characters or generalized types for mans
spiritual good.
The origins of the type are not easily traced. When it appears in our first
text it is already fully formed. Earlier possible examples such as the Paternoster
and Creed plays are, as we have seen, lost. The elements which enter into it
are common in medieval literature. The allegorical method and admonitory
purpose are everywhere in the Middle Ages and its main themes are known
in various forms. Thus, the conflict of personified vices and virtues forms the
subject of a long Latin poem by the fourth-century poet Prudentius.31 The
summons of Death, bringing home the warning that death strikes often when
least expected and is no respecter of persons, was present in the medieval
treatments of the Dance of Death, although more familiar to us in Holbeins
famous series of woodcuts. The argument of the Four Daughters of God,
Mercy and Peace pleading for mans salvation and Righteousness and Truth
for his eternal punishment, was a widespread motif, and we have already
discussed the Debate between the Body and Soul in its Middle English form.
But these things represent the ultimate, not the immediate, sources of the
morality play. It has been suggested that the medieval sermon was often rather
dramatic in character and by others that allegorical figures occasionally occur
in the mystery plays. By what process of synthesis, however, these various
elements of theme and method were gradually or suddenly combined into
the morality play we cannot say.
The earliest play of this type that has come down to us, The Pride of
Life,32 dates from about 1400. It is unfortunately incomplete, but a long
prologue tells us what to expect, and the five hundred lines that we have
are more than half of the play and enable us to judge adequately of its
character and quality. A King shows, by his boastful speech that he fears
nothingnot even Deathand his knights, Fortitude (or Strength) and
Sanitas (or Health), assure him that with their help he will live forever.
The Queen is not so sure. She reminds him that all men die and that Holy
Church bids him think of his end. Her words have little effect and she
sends for the Bishop. Although the Bishop preaches a long sermon on the
evils of the timeswit is now treachery, love is now lechery, rich men are
ruthless, etc.and urges the King to mend his ways, the King is defiant.
31
The Psychomachia, of which the best edition is that of Joannes Bergman (Vienna, 1926; Corpus
Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, LXI); English trans. by Mary L.Porter (Raleigh, N.C., 1929;
Meredith College, Raleigh, Quar. Bull., Ser. 23, No. I). On the subject, in general see E.N.S.Thompson,
The English Moral Plays (New Haven, 1910; Trans. Conn. Acad., xiv. 291414), and W.Roy Mackenzie,
The English Moralities from the Point of View of Allegory (Boston, 1914).
32
The text of many of the early moralities may be found in A.Brandl, Quellen des weltlichen
Dramas in England vor Shakespeare (Strassburg, 1898), J.M.Manly, Specimens of the Pre-Shakespearian
Drama (2V, Boston, 1897), and J.Q.Adams, Chief Pre-Shakespearean Dramas (Boston, 1924).
285
He will try conclusions with Death and sends his messenger, Mirth, to seek
him out. The text breaks off in the midst of Mirths proclamation, but from
the prologue we know that Death fought with the King and slew him. Although
the arrangement of the dialogue is rather mechanicalin the beginning all
speeches are three quatrains longthere are vigorous passages, and the author
was not unskilful in the management of the action.
It is interesting that this, the earliest of the English moralities of which any
part has come down to us, should have as its theme the summons of Death,
the theme of the last and greatest of the medieval moralities, Everyman. The
fact that its characters are for the most part not abstractions but individuals
generalized to represent a class may suggest that we have in The Pride of Life
something like a transition stage to the more fully developed, abstract, type.
In subject and treatment its closest affinity is to the scene depicting the death
of Herod in the Ludus Coventriae, to which the resemblance is rather striking.
Like the mystery plays The Pride of Life was performed outdoors, as the
opening lines with a reference to the weather show, and the audience was a
fairly mixed one.
The longest and most comprehensive of the English moralities of the fifteenth
century is The Castle of Perseverance.33 It contains over 3600 lines and tells the
story of mans career from birth to death and final judgment. We see him,
alternately persuaded by his good and bad angels, yielding to the delights of
the World. Even after he has been rescued and brought to the Castle of
Perseverance with the Seven Virtues as defenders against the forces of the World,
the Flesh, and the Devil, he is lured again into sin; We witness his death, the
bitter chiding of the Body by the Soul, and his final trial, with the Four Daughters
of God arrayed on opposite sides, pleading respectively for mercy and strict
justice. Like the Pride of Life it was given outdoors and an interesting diagram
in the MS shows the arrangement of the playing space. Of very different
character is the morality of Wisdom, also known as Mind, Will, and
Understanding.34 It requires a large cast and calls for elaborate and expensive
costuming. The Devil entices Mind, Will, and Understanding from what appears
to be the monastic life, but in the end they are recalled and brought to repentance
by Wisdom, who is Christ. It can hardly have been intended for a popular
audience, and it has been suggested that its purpose was to combat the growing
tendency of monks to desert their monasteries.35 We cannot at present date the
play more closely than c. 1460. A still stranger production is the play known as
Mankind.36 Here we have the framework of the morality adapted to the
33
The text is edited by F.J.Furnivall and A.W.Pollard in The Macro Plays (1904; EETSES, 91). A
facsimile of the MS is included in J.S.Farmers Students Facsimile Series. For discussion see Walter
K.Smart The Castle of Perseverance: Place, Date, and a Source, Manly Anniversary Studies (Chicago,
1923), pp. 4253, where reasons are advanced for assigning the play to Lincolnshire, c. 1405.
34
Also edited in The Macro Plays, as above.
35
See the valuable monograph of Walter K.Smart, Some English and Latin Sources and Parallels
for the Morality of Wisdom (Menasha, 1912).
36
Printed among The Macro Plays, as above, and in Manly, Adams, etc. For date and locality see
W.K.Smart, Some Notes on Mankind MP, XIV (1916). 4558; 293313.
The
Castle of
Perseverance
Wisdom
Mankind
286
Everyman
purposes of low comedy. It was performed in an inn-yard and a collection

was taken from the spectators at a certain point in the performance. So far as
the play has a morality motive at all it is to be found in the character of
Mercy who in the beginning urges gratitude to God for mans redemption
and stresses his own large part in it, and at the end chides Mankind for
paying so little heed to his words. But most of the play is given over to horseplay and coarse humor. Some of the lines are unprintable. As a morality play
it is so debased as to be rather a contradiction of the type, but it is valuable as
showing the step that had been taken by about 1471 towards the popular
stage.
Somewhat later, probably around the turn of the century, we get the classic
of the English morality plays, Everyman.37 With a fine sense of unity the play
avoids any direct representation of Everymans heedless life and confines
itself to the hour in which he receives the summons of Death. Told by the
messenger that he must go on a long journey, he pleads in vain for a delay
and has only the consolation of knowing that he can ask his more intimate
friends to accompany him. But he finds that Fellowship, Kindred, Cousin,
and Worldly Goods cannot or will not go with him into the next world.
Good Deeds, with whom he has had all too little to do in his lifetime, alone
stands by him and descends with him finally into the grave. In its 900 lines
Everyman conveys its lesson with a simple effectiveness that has been more
than once demonstrated by revivals on the modern stage.38
The morality play represents a collateral line in the descent of English
drama. From the Mak episode to the Four Ps to Gammer Gurtons Needle
we perceive a continuity in which the morality forms no essential link and
into which it can hardly be fitted. Its place is off to one side. At a point in
the development of the drama (about the beginning of the fifteenth century)
when the mystery cycles are approaching maturity, it appears as a
type of play which does not concern Bible story and which suggests the
homily in dramatized form. While it must be considered somehow an
offshoot from the main dramatic stem, its origin is far from clear. After a
brief career it loses its distinctive character and in the sixteenth
century lives only, in much altered form, in the didactic interlude such as
Wealth and Health, or the moral interlude such as The Nice Wanton,
or as the medium of religious controversy. Its elements occasionally appear
37
Often edited; an excellent text by W.W.Greg in Materialien zur Kunde des lteren englischen
Dramas, IV (Louvain, 1904); modernized in Clarence G.Child, The Second Shepherds Play, Everyman,
and Other Early Plays (Boston, 1910).
38
It is a disputed question whether Everyman or its exact counterpart, the Dutch play Elckerlijc,
is the original, but it is almost certain now that the Dutch play is the earlier. The more important
discussions of the subject are K.H.De Raaf, Den Spyeghel der Salicheyt van Elckerlijc (Groningen,
1897); H.Logeman, Elckerlijc-Everyman, de Vraag naar de Prioriteit opnieuw onderzocht (Gand, 1902);
J.M.Manly, Elckerlijc-Everyman: The Question of Priority, MP, VIII (191011). 269277; F.A.Wood,
Elckerlijc-Everyman: The Question of Priority, MP, VIII (191011). 279302; E.R.Tigg, Is Elckerlijc
prior to Everyman? JEGP, XXXVIII (1939). 568596. All except De Raaf (supported by Creizenach,
CHEL, v. 59n, English ed., p. 53n) argue for the priority of the Dutch play.
287
in Elizabethan chronicle play, comedy, and tragedy, but otherwise by the

time of Shakespeare it drops out of sight until the performance of Everyman
inspired in the twentieth century a temporary revival in such plays as The
Passing of the Third Floor Back and The Servant in the House.39
39
This revival is treated in Joseph W.Barley, The Morality Motive in Contemporary English Drama
(Univ. of Penna. diss., Mexico, Mo., 1912).
XX
Ebb Tide
The
Fifteenth
Century
Continuing
Tradition
The fifteenth century is commonly dismissed as a dreary and barren waste in

the history of English literature. Such a judgment is severe, and results in part
from the readers disappointment when he finds that the high level reached
at the end of the fourteenth century in the Pearl, Sir Gawain and the Green
Knight, Piers Plowman, and the poetry of Chaucer is not maintained in the
work of Lydgate, Hoccleve, and their contemporaries. Moreover, the fifteenth
century has little new to offer. In many respects it continues the fourteenth,
rather than breaking new ground. Its poets appear as followers of Chaucer
and Gower, and later of Lydgate, rather than as leaders pointing new
directions. It continues to treat the themes and types already current. Thus it
shows an unbroken continuity with the past, and for this reason we have
considered some of the works of this century along with those of earlier
periods, especially in the chapters on the romance, the lyric, and the drama.
However, in the drama and in English prose the fifteenth century made
significant contributions. We should not forget that it was the century which
produced Malory and the Second Shepherds Play.1
Nowhere is the fifteenth century more plainly the child of the fourteenth
than in its religious writings. Many of these works, except for the tyranny
of dates, could be thought of as products of the earlier period. At the
beginning of the century two of the three parts of Deguillevilles trilogy2
were rendered into English. Lydgate made a verse translation of the first in
his Pilgrimage of the Life of Man,3 while an anonymous translator turned
it into excellent prose.4 There were still other translations, including one by
Skelton now lost. An English prose version of the second, known as Grace
Dieu, or The Pilgrimage of the Soul, made in 1413, has survived in at least
1
The literary history of the fifteenth century remains to be written, although there are useful
chapters in Vol. II of the CHEL. In the absence of Professor Wells long promised bibliography we are
dependent upon the CBEL and Lena L.Tucker and Allen R.Benham, A Bibliography of Fifteenth Century
Literature (Seattle, 1928; Univ. of Wash. Pub. in Long, and Lit., Vol. II, No. 3). F.J.Snells The Age of
Transition: 14001580 (2v, 1905) covers the period rather superficially. G.Gregory Smith, The Transition
Period (1900; Periods of European Literature, ed. Geo. Saintsbury, Vol. IV) gives the European
background. Eleanor P.Hammond, English Verse between Chaucer and Surrey (Durham, N.C., 1927),
offers a selection from the poetry with valuable commentary. W.A.Neilson and K.G.T.Webster, Chief
British Poets of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries (Boston, 1916) is a volume of modernizations.
2
Le Plerinage de la Vie Humaine (133031, revised 1355), Le Plerinage de lAme (between 1330
and 1358), Le Plerinage de Jhesucrist (1358). All three poems have been edited by J.J.Strzinger for
the Roxburghe Club (189397).
3
See the discussion of Lydgate below.
4
The Pilgrimage of the Lyf of the Manhode, ed. Wm. A.Wright (1869; Roxburghe Club).
288
EBB TIDE
289
eight manuscripts,5 and was printed by Caxton in 1483. These two poems of
Deguilleville obviously stem from the Roman de la Rose and look forward to
Bunyan. Dives and Pauper (140510) is a long prose treatise in dialogue
form. It is a treatment of the Ten Commandments with an extended prologue
on poverty and is still unedited.6 Touching the mystical tradition at one or
more removes is Nicholas Loves Mirrour of the Blessed Lyf of Jesu Christ (c.
1410),7 a free translation of parts of the Meditationes Vitae Christi doubtfully
attributed to St. Bonaventura, from which Rolle had previously drawn. The
Orologium Sapientiae, or The Seven Points of True Wisdom 8 was translated
from the German mystic, Henry Suso, by an unknown chaplain for an
unknown moste worschipful lady. The Revelations of St. Birgitta9 was
naturally inspired by the establishment of the Bridgettine order in England in
1415. Legends of the saints continued to be written, although this type of
narrative was soon to disappear from English poetry. Osbern Bokenham, a
suffolke man, frere Austyn of the convent of Stokclare (Stoke Clare),
composed a collection of thirteen Legendys of Hooly Wummen10 (c. 1445)
running to more than 10,000 lines. It may be compared with legends in the
South English Legendary, manuscripts of which continued to be copied
throughout the fifteenth century. Into one of them was inserted a new version
of the Theophilus legend, the story of the clerk who, like Faustus, sold his
soul to the devil, in this case for worldly goods. But unlike Faustus he was
saved from carrying out his compact when the Virgin went to Hell and forced
Satan to return the charter. This version11 is in lively six-line stanzas (romance
sixes) and with its free use of dialogue reminds us of some of the shorter
romances.
We may note also as growing out of the fourteenth century the efforts to
defend or expound the doctrines of Wyclif. Best known of these is the
Apology for Lollard Doctrines, a lengthy tract at one time attributed to
Wyclif himself.12 In it the author takes up, one by one, thirty points of
Lollard belief, which he apparently has been accused of holding, and defends
5
Cf. Ward, Cat. of Romances, II. 580585, and Victor H.Paltsits, The Petworth Manuscript of
Grace Dieu, Bull. N.Y.Pub. Library, XXII (1928). 715720. The Caxton text (with some omissions)
will be found in Katherine I.Cust, The Booke of the Pylgremage of the Sowle (1859).
6
There are six MSS and three early printed editions. See H.G.Richardson, Dives and Pauper,
N&Q, II Ser., IV (1911). 321323; H.G.Pfander, Dives et Pauper, Library, 4 Ser., XIV (1933). 299
312; H.G.Richardson, Dives and Pauper, ibid., XV (1934). 3137. The Seven Deadly Sins and their
contrasting virtues are worked into a fanciful allegory in the Speculum Misericordiae, printed by Rossell
H.Robbins, PMLA, LIV (1939). 935966.
7
Ed. Lawrence F.Powell (1908). Twenty-three manuscripts attest its popularity, besides the fact
that it was printed by Caxton, Pynson, and Wynkyn de Worde (twice).
8
Ed. K.Horstmann, Anglia, X (1888). 323389.
9
Ed. W.P.Gumming (1929; EETS, 178). To the second quarter of the century is to be assigned the
verse translation of the Revelations of Methodius (ed. Charlotte DEvelyn, PMLA, XXXIII. 135203).
10
Ed. Mary S.Serjeanston (1938: EETS, 206). Sister Mary Jeremy, The English Prose-Translation
of Legenda Aurea, MLN, LIX (1944). 181183, has revived the suggestion that Bokenham may have
been the translator of the prose version preserved in a number of manuscripts and used by Caxton
along with other sources.
11
Ed. W.Heuser, ESt, XXXII (1903). 123.
12
As by its editor, J.H.Todd (1842; Camden Soc., XX).
Bokenham
The
Lollards
290
Secular
Works
his views: the pope is not Christs vicar on earth, it is wrong to sell indulgences,
to excommunicate, to encourage the worship of images, etc. Another defense
of basic Wyclif doctrines, The Lanterne of Lizt13 (c. 1410), discusses such
matters as the supreme authority of the Bible, the primary importance of
preaching, the evil of clerical endowments, and the authority of the pope,
considered to be Antichrist. On the whole, the tone of both these tracts is
moderate. Certainly they are less belligerent than the Remonstrance against
Romish Corruptions in the Church,14 by Wyclifs friend and disciple John
Purvey, at the close of the previous century (1395).
When we turn to secular writings we find the fifteenth century likewise
carrying on the conventions and traditions of the fourteenth. The use of allegory
and the dream-vision as a framework for popular didacticism, a device with a
long and distinguished history extending from Martianus Capella and Boethius
down, is seen in The Court of Sapience15 (c. 1465). In this poem of some 2300
lines in rime royal we have first a debate between the Four Daughters of God,
carried on at length, and then we are taken with the author on a dream journey
to the Court of Sapience, where the Seven Liberal Arts are expounded. Thus
theological and secular instruction is fitted into a slight allegorical framework.
Something like the same purpose lies behind The Assembly of Gods.16 formerly
attributed, like the Court of Sapience, to Lydgate. Here a dispute among the
Gods is followed by a battle between the Seven Deadly Sins and their
corresponding virtues, recalling the Psychomachia of Prudentius, and leading
to an explanation by Doctrine and others of the gradual progress from idolatry
to reconciliation in New Testament times. The many personages which are
introduced do not make easier the task of following the complicated allegory.
Sidrac and Boctus, by Hugh of Campedene,17 is a verse translation in over
12,000 lines of the Fontaine de Toutes Sciences,18 offering instruction on a
variety of topicstheological, cosmological, sociological, moral, and others
in a dialogue between the sage Sidrac and King Boctus of Bactria. More frankly
practical are George Ripleys Compend of Alchemy 19 (1471) and the
anonymous Libell (Little Book) of Englische Policye20 (c. 1436), which put
into verse quite mundane matters. The former explains the pseudo-science
13
Ed. Lilian M.Swinburn (1917; EETS, 151).

Ed. J.Forshall (London, 1851).
15
Ed. Robert Spindler (Leipzig, 1927; Beitrge zur engl. Phil., VI). On the sources see Curt F.Bhler,
The Sources of the Court of Sapience (Leipzig, 1932) in the same series.
16
Ed. Oscar L.Triggs (1896; EETSES, 69). The movement of the lines, each hurrying on to the end,
is utterly unlike Lydgate, who loves a caesura and, as Miss Hammond remarks, seems to think in halflines. The piece has been dated 1403 and 142022. I should put it on stylistic grounds not much earlier
than the earliest manuscript, which is not older than 1468.
17
See K.Blbring, Sidrac in England, Festschrift fr Wendelin Foerster (Halle, 1902), pp. 443
478. There was also a translation in prose, of which a fragment is preserved.
18
See Hist. Litt., XXXI (1893). 285318.
19
Last printed in Elias Ashmole, Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum (1652); extract in Hammond,
op. cit. Ripley wrote much on scientific subjects in Latin (see Tanner, op. cit.).
20
Ed. Thomas Wright, Political Poems (185961), Wilhelm Hertzberg (Leipzig, 1878), and Sir George
Warner (Oxford, 1926). Selections in Hammond, op. cit. Abridged and modernized text in W.H.Dunham,
Jr. and Stanley Pargellis, Complaint and Reform in England. 14361714 (1938), pp. 330.
14
EBB TIDE
291
of alchemy to Edward IV in rime royal; the latter deals with foreign trade and
what ought to be Englands commercial policy.
Social satire of the Piers Plowman type is skilfully presented in the little
ballad known as London Lickpenny.21 The poets experiences in London, where
he is unable to get any attention at the Kings Bench, Common Pleas, or
Chancery, and succeeds only in being robbed of his hood, are told in sixteen
eight-line stanzas, most of which end in the refrain, For lacke of money, I
may not spede. The Scottish tradition of Harbour is continued in the work
of Blind Harry the minstrel, who presents something of a problem. Toward
the end of the fifteenth century he appears in the records as receiving small
gifts from the king, and ever since this time he has been remembered as the
author of the most popular poem in Scotland down to the eighteenth century.
The poem, The Wallace22 (c. 1475), is an epic of some 11,000 lines recounting
the heroic deeds of the Scottish patriot Sir William Wallace, who was finally
captured and executed by the English in 1305. The humble origin of Blind
Harry and his blindness from birth are facts incompatible with the literary
character of the poem, its aureate vocabulary,23 the extensive topographical
knowledge displayed, which is detailed and exact, and above all the many
borrowings from other works of English and French literature. It is likely that
the poem in its present form owes much to another hand.24 About 1450 Richard
Holland, a priest and follower of the Douglases, wrote The Buke of the Howlat
(Owl).25 It is the familiar story of the bird that became overproud of its borrowed
plumage, with nice satirical implications in the parts assigned to the various
other birds. Any general political allegory, however, which the poem may have
had was probably slight and has now lost its meaning.
Throughout the fifteenth century the authority of Chaucer was paramount,
although Gower is mentioned with almost equal respect. Lydgate pays tribute
to him on numerous occasions, always in the same tone, as
The noble poete of Breteyne,
My mayster Chaucer.
Hoccleve, whose affection seems to have sprung from personal acquaintance,
calls him maister deere and fadir reverent. That he felt Chaucers death deeply
is apparent from the frequency with which he alludes to it:
Death, by thi deth, hath harm irreparable
Unto us doon;
21
Printed in Hammoad, pp. 238239.

Edited by John Jamieson (2V, Edinburgh, 1820) and James Moir (1889; STS, 67,17); facsimile,
ed. Sir William Craigie (1939). On the writers mentioned in this paragraph see William Geddie, A
Bibliography of Middle Scots Poets (Edinburgh, 1912; STS, 61); T.F. Henderson, Scottish Vernacular
Literature (3ed., Edinburgh, 1910).
23
The excessive use of Latin derivatives, often slightly assimilated. See John C.Mendenhall, Aureate
Terms: A Study in the Literary Diction of the Fifteenth Century (Lancaster, Pa., 1919).
24
See the exhaustive examination of the problem by J.T.T.Brown, The Wallace and The Bruce
Restudied (Bonn, 1900; Banner Beitrge zur Anglistik., VI), where an interesting case is made out for
John Ramsay, known to Dunbar as Sir John the Ross. The identification, however, is disputed.
25
The best edition is in F.J.Amours, Scottish Alliterative Poems (1897; STS. 27), pp. 4781.
22
London
Lickpenny
The
Wallace
The
Chaucerians
292
and he had his portrait painted in his Regiment of Princes to pute othir men
in remembraunce of his persone. Many other writers pay Chaucer lip service26
or follow his example, albeit at long remove. For the qualities that make
Chaucer great are those incapable of imitation. As Lydgate says:
We may assay forto countrefete
His gay style but it wyl not be.
Additional It is not easy to follow the Chaucer tradition in the fifteenth century since it
Canterbury takes a variety of forms and ranges from close dependence, in poets like
Hoccleve and Henryson, to occasional verbal echoes which merely indicate
Tales
familiarity with Chaucers works. Some go so far as to include among the
Chaucerians any one who wrote in Chaucers better-known metres, such
as the Troilus stanza (rime royal). But such influence is doubtless in many
cases at second or third hand. In the anonymous Plowmans Tale27 we have a
very un-Chaucerian piece arbitrarily attached to the Canterbury Tales. It is a
Lollard tract in verse form, in which, under the guise of a conversation between
a griffon and a pelican, the author launches into a long denunciation of the
pope and the clergytheir pride, luxury, greed and the evil practices resulting
therefrom, and many other abuses within the Church. Almost every idea
expressed can be paralleled in the writings of Wyclif and his followers, but it
is not without interest as a tract for the times and its irony is sometimes
telling. More successfully fitted to the Canterbury Tales is the Tale of Beryn28
with its Prologue detailing the doings of the pilgrims in the cathedral town
and especially the ill-starred attempt of the Pardoner to spend the night with
Kit the bar-maid. The Prologue has some of Chaucers realistic vigor, but
none at all of his sly humor or happy turn of phrase. The tale is rather longdrawn-out. Besides these attempts to continue the Canterbury Tales we should
note that Lydgates Siege of Thebes, discussed below, is fitted with a prologue
likewise linking it with the return journey.
In the early editions of Chaucer a number of poems by other poets were
commonly included. Some of these were considered genuine, others included
because they were in Chaucers manner. Apart from pieces by poets like
Lydgate and Hoccleve and Henryson, who will be discussed later, a
little sheaf of poems deserves mention. La Belle Dame sans Mercy29 is a
translation in 856 lines from Alain Chartier. The translators preface and
the opening of the poem proper, with its garden and gentlefolk and the
approach to the conversation between the lover and his lady, are such as
Chaucer might have devised, but he never could have carried on the tiresome
and long-winded debate in which the lover pleads and the lady repels all his
26
Caroline F.E.Spurgeon, Five Hundred Years of Chaucer Criticism and Allusion, 13571900 (3V,
Cambridge, 1925).
27
Printed by Skeat in the Oxford Chaucer, VII. 147190. From an allusion in the poem and from
other considerations it is apparent that it was written by the author of Pierce the Ploughmans Creed.
28
Ed. F.J.Furnivall and W.G.Stone (1909; EETSES, 105).
29
All the pieces mentioned in this paragraph are printed in Vol. VII of the Oxford Chaucer.
EBB TIDE
293
pleas for mercy. The author, Sir Richard Ros, about whom little is known
except his parentage, does not have much to recommend him but a certain
metrical skill. The Flower and the Leaf is somewhat lacking in substance. It
is little more than a tableau gracefully described,30 in which one company of
knights and ladies representing the Flower gets drenched in a shower and is
hospitably given shelter by another company representing the Leaf. The author
alludes to herself as a woman, and since this is true also of another poem.
The Assembly of Ladies, it has been suggested that they are both by the same
writer. But since the former is thought to date from about 1450 31 and the
latter shows a much later treatment of the final e, this is at least doubtful.
The Assembly of Ladies is not very logically planned. In the usual dream
convention the author, along with her four companions and many others, is
peremptorily summoned to appear before a lady named Loyalt, merely to
allow each one to present a bill complaining of broken promises,
disappointment in love, and the like. The poem owes something to Lydgates
Temple of Glas. In tone and phrasing the most Chaucerian of all these
apocryphal pieces is a little poem of 290 lines called The Cuckoo and the
Nightingale. In the manuscripts it is just as fittingly called The Book of Cupid,
God of Love, for it explains that the God of Love has great power over folk,
even over the poet, who is old and unlusty. The body of the poem is a
dispute between the two birds over the joys and sorrows of love, recalling at
times in setting and circumstances the altercation in the Owl and the
Nightingale. On the basis of an Explicit Clanvowe in the Cambridge MS it
has been attributed to Sir Thomas Clanvowe, a friend of Chaucers friend,
Lewis Clifford, and quite possibly known to Chaucer himself.32 But whatever
its authorship the piece has quite enough charm to account for its influence
on Milton in his sonnet To the Nightingale and for the modernization
found among Wordsworths poems.
In many ways the Scottish Chaucerians were more successful in their
efforts than their English contemporaries. In 1406, at the age of eleven,
the young King James I of Scotland was captured by the English and for
eighteen years was a prisoner in England. He does not seem to have been
badly treated and had plenty of leisure in which to acquire the intimate
knowledge of Chaucers poetry which he shows. Upon his release in 1424
he was married to Joan Beaufort, the niece of two of the most powerful
magnates in England. The story of his capture and imprisonment, his falling
in love at first sight when, like Palamon in the Knights Tale, he caught a
glimpse of a surpassingly beautiful lady in the garden below his prison
window, and the dream in which he is carried aloft, like Chaucer in the
Hous of Fame, to the palace of Venus and later is advised by Minerva
30
Dryden, who translated it in his Fables Ancient and Modern, thought it was by Chaucer and
says, I was so particularly pleased, both for the invention and the moral, that I cannot hinder myself
from recommending it to the reader.
31
It must be admitted that the dates of these poems are highly conjectural.
32
Kittredge (MP, I. 1318) argued for Sir John Clanvowe, who died in 1391. Although Skeats
dating of the poem after 1402 is none too secure, Thomas seems the better candidate.
The
Flower
and the
Leaf
The
Assembly
of Ladies
The
Cuckoo
and the
Nightingale
Scottish
Chaucerians
294
The Kingis
Quair
Robert
Henryson
The
Testament
of
Cresseid
such incidents form the subject of The Kingis Quair (Kings Book).33
Written apparently just before his release, in a language the Chaucerian
character of which has been somewhat obscured by Scottish copyists,34 it
makes a very pleasing little romantic story out of facts which are in part at
least autobiographical. As its 197 stanzas are those of Chaucers Troilus the
form has generally been known since as rime royal. Later in the century
another Scottish poet, Robert Henryson, schoolmaster of Dunfermline, caught
some of the spirit of Chaucer in his Fables,35 where he told such stories as
The Cock and the Fox and The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse,
adding to each, however, a rather un-Chaucerian moral. He turned the
tale of Orpheus and Eurydice into rime royal and wrote a number of shorter
moralizing pieces. His ballad of Robene and MaKyne has been admired as an
early pastoral and considered superior to the Nut Brown Maid, a judgment
with which many will agree. But the poem which attaches itself most closely
to Chaucer is The Testament of Cresseid. In this piece Cresseid, deserted by
Diomede, curses the gods and is punished by leprosy. Ashamed to be seen by
her friends, she goes to the spittel-house to live among the lepers. The crowning
torture which she endures is to be given alms, as one of the beggars, by
Troilus, whom Henryson represents as still living and who happens to pass
by in a company of knights. Neither recognizes the other at the time, although
Troilus is disturbed by a puzzling resemblance to Cresseid and she afterwards
learns who he was. In a closing lament Cresseid blames her own unfaithfulness
on lustis lecherous, crying
Fy! fals Cresseid! O, trew knight Troilus!
Charles
dOrlans
The poem presents a grim incident with moving pathos, and shows how a
less tolerant poet would have concluded Chaucers great poem.
Although the English translations of the poems of Charles dOrlans36
contain occasional echoes of Chaucer, he may be mentioned here not so much
because he shows the influence of Chaucer as because he is the heir to the
French tradition of Deschamps and Froissart which so greatly influenced
Chaucer. In the case of Charles dOrlans this tradition expressed itself wholly
in the conventional chanson and ballade of love. In spite of an occasional
sentiment or graceful phrase that recaptures ones attention, the poems tend
to become tiresome in their repetition of a few stock themespraise of the
lady, appeals for pity, avowal of lifelong service, conventional despair, and
the like. Such poetry is something of an anachronism in the second quarter of
the fifteenth century.
33
The most recent editions are those of Alex. Lawson (1910), W.W.Skeat (1911; STS, n.s. I), and
W.Mackay Mackenzie (1939). The date and authorship of the poem have been questioned, but without
much success. The most authoritative biography of James I is that of E.W.M.Balfour-Melville (1936).
34
Sir William Craigie, The Language of the Kingis Quair, E&S, XXV (1940). 2238.
35
The works of Henryson have been edited by G.Gregory Smith (3V, 190614; STS, 55, 58, 64),
and in one volume by H.Harvey Wood (2ed, Edinburgh, 1958).
36
Ed. Robert Steele (1941; EETS, 215; notes by Robert Steele and Mabel Day, 1946, EETS, 220).
EBB TIDE
295
It has been said that John Lydgate lived thirty years too long for the good
of his literary reputation. Be this as it may, it is certain that to the last half of
his life belong most of the incredibly voluminous writings which students of
literary history know, if only by name, today. He was born in Lydgate, in
Suffolk, probably around 1370, and at the age of about fifteen was admitted
to the nearby abbey of Bury St. Edmunds. It is suspected that he was sent to
study for a time at one of the universities. In any case he was ordained a
priest in 1397, after which we know nothing more about him for nearly
twenty years. In 1423 he was elected prior of Hatfield Broadoak, in Essex.
He soon relinquished the office, certainly by 143037 and possibly in 1425, for
about 1426 he was in Paris, and probably remained long enough to have
translated a poetical pedigree for the Earl of Warwick, written the Dance of
Macabre, and begun his translation of Deguilleville, this last at the command
of the Earl of Salisbury. From 1434 until he died Lydgate was back at Bury
St. Edmunds. The date of his death is uncertain, but it probably occurred in
the year 1449.38
Among Lydgates poems, which run to well over 100,000 lines, there are
many unsolved problems of chronology, but fortunately his longer pieces can
all be dated with some approximation to definiteness. His selection from
Aesops fables and The Churl and the Bird39 were probably written toward
the close of the fourteenth century. To the period just after 1400 belong certain
pieces in which the influence of Chaucer is very evidentthe Floure of
Curtesy,40 a valentine poem praising his lady in the courtly love manner, the
Complaint of the Black Knight,41 which echoes the situation in Chaucers
Book of the Duchess, and the Temple of Glas,42 in which a surpassingly
beautiful lady complains to Venus of being separated from her knight, the
knight reveals his love sickness, and the lovers are happily united through the
favor of the goddess. The last employs the familiar convention of the imaginary
dream. Between these poems and the beginning of the Troy Book in 1412
stands Reason and Sensuality, after the Troy Book the Life of Our Lady.
Reason and Sensuality43 (c. 1408), in spite of its 7000 lines, still makes rather
pleasant reading with its allegory of the poets meeting with Venus and the
journey to the Garden of Pleasure which Guillaume de Lorris had acquainted
us with in the Roman de la Rose. The Life of Our Lady44 (nearly 6000 lines
in rime royal) is now edited.
Lydgates later years were occupied by a series of enormous translations
37
See Georg Fiedler, Zum Leben Lydgates, Anglia, XV (1893). 389395.

The best account of his life is that of J.Schick in his edition of the Temple of Glas (1891; EETSES,
60), followed not too cautiously by the DNB.
39
Both in The Minor Poems of John Lydgate, ed. Henry N.MacCracken, Vol. II (1934; EETS,
192).
40
Minor Poems, II. 410418.
41
Minor Poems, II. 382410.
42
Ed. Schick, as above.
43
Ed. Ernst Sieper (19013; EETSES, 84, 89).
44
Ed. Joseph A.Lauritis, Ralph A.Klinefelter, and Vernon F.Gallagher (Pittsburgh, 1961: Duquesne
Univ. Stud., Philol. Ser., No. 2).
38
Lydgate
His
Voluminous
Production
296
His
Translations
Shorter
Pieces
of well-known works. The Troy Book45 (30,117 lines in decasyllabic couplets),

rendered from the Latin prose of Guido della Colonna, occupied most of his
time from 1412 to 1420. This was followed by the Siege of Thebes46 (1420
22), based on a French prose condensation of the Roman de Thbes. It is
provided, as already noted, with a prologue attaching it to the homeward
journey of Chaucers Canterbury pilgrims, and serves as a companion piece
to the Knights Tale on the outward journey. Although only 4716 lines, it is
still too long for such an occasion. The Pilgrimage of the Life of Man47 (1426
30) fills nearly 24,000 lines in octosyllabic couplets. It renders the first of
Deguillevilles three Plerinages (see p. 288). Finally, the longest of all his
works, The Fall of Princes (143138), is also the most tedious. One can
hardly appreciate the taste of an age which endured more than 26,000 lines
detailing the tragedies which have befallen the great.48 It is based on the
French prose Des Cas des Nobles Hommes et Femmes of Laurent de
Premierfait, itself an expansion of Boccaccios De Casibus Virorum Illustrium.
At the time of his death Lydgate was at work on the Secrees of Old Philisoffres,
a translation of the Secreta Secretorum attributed in the Middle Ages to
Aristotle. It was finished by a disciple, possibly Benedict Burgh.49
In addition to his longer works Lydgates shorter pieces fill two volumes
in modern print.50 He was evidently known as a ready versifier, able to turn
out a poem suitable for any occasion, and therefore during most of his life
was at the call of any one who chose to command his services. He wrote
poems on the occasion of Henry VIs coronation, on Gloucesters marriage,
on a royal entry into London, the departure of Thomas Chaucer for the
Continent, etc. He composed verses for mummings at Bishopswood, Eltham,
Hartford, London, Windsor, and for the mercers and the goldsmiths of
London.51 His lyrics and shorter poems likewise show a certain unmonastic
variety. There are, of course, many religious lyrics of the types familiar
to us elsewherehymns and prayers to the Virgin and Christ, translations
of Latin hymns, little sermons in verse, and all varieties of hortatory
and devotional poems. They are marked by sincerity, smoothness of metre,
and an occasional happy image. Some, like the God Is Myn Helpere
and An Holy Medytacion, are among the best things he wrote. There are
45
Ed. Henry Bergen (190635; EETSES, 97, 103, 106, 126). On Lydgates sources see, in addition to
Bergen, E.Bagby Atwood, Some Minor Sources of Lydgates Troy Book, SP, XXXV (1938). 2542.
46
Ed. Axel Erdmann and Eilert Ekwall (191130; EETSES, 108, 125).
47
Ed. F.J.Furnivall and Katharine B.Locock (18991904; EETSES, 77, 83, 92).
48
Ed. Henry Bergen (192427; EETSES, 121124). He well characterize it as a collection gathered
throughout the centuries describing the most memorable and crushing blows dealt by fate to the
illustrious personages of mythology and history, and written, as the author himself said, with the
object of teaching princes the virtue of wisdom and moderation by holding up to them the example of
misfortunes provoked by egotism, pride and inordinate ambition.
49
Ed. Robert Steele (1894; EETSES, 66). Other fifteenth-century translations in prose are edited
by Steele (1898; EETSES, 74). On Benedict Burgh see below, p. 302.
50
Henry N.MacCracken, The Minor Poems of John Lydgate (191134; EETSES, 107 and EETS,
192). The first volume contains a discussion of the Lydgate canon.
51
These are all printed by MacCracken, as above. On the general type see Robert Withington,
English Pageantry: Art Historical Outline (2V, Cambridge, Mass., 191820).
EBB TIDE
297
didactic and moralizing pieces ranging from A Dietary, giving simple rules
for good health, or Stans Puer ad Mensam, teaching the rules of courtesy and
conduct, to his own Testament, which combines moral reflection with
interesting autobiographical allusions. Of similar utilitarian aim are
admonitory pieces like the Dance of Macabre or fables like The Churl and
the Bird and Horse, Goose, and Sheep, with its refrain advising man For no
prerogatif his neyghburghe to dispise. The good monk saw nothing
inappropriate in composing an occasional love poem in the courtly tradition,
such as My Lady Dere or A Lovers New Years Gift, and his muse occasionally
takes a humorous and satirical turn as in Bycorne and Chychevache and The
Order of Fools. Bycorne and Chychevache presents an amusing picture of a
fat and a lean beast, who feed only on patient husbands and wives respectively.
Chychevache is distressingly thin; she complains that it is a dear year in
patient wives. The Order of Fools describes a new mendicant order which is
made up of all sorts from the sacrilegious and adulterous to the credulous
and those who marry an old woman for money. It is not right to think of all
these shorter pieces as the work of Lydgates early years, but it is true that his
standing as a poet would have been higher if he had written only these and
had not made the interminable translations which constitute the great bulk
of his writings.
Some blame for the latter, however, must be shared by the numerous patrons
who requested him to make them. The Life of Our Lady and the Troy Book
were written at the command of Prince Hal, while the Fall of Princes was
translated at the desire of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, uncle and regent
of Henry VI. The Deguilleville was for Thomas de Montacute, Earl of
Salisbury. When Henry VI visited the shrine of St. Edmund at Christmas in
1422 Lydgates abbot commanded him to write the Legend of St. Edmund
and Fremund, and when the abbot of St. Albans wished his house to be
honored in a similar way he turned to the monk of Bury for the Life of Albon
and Amphabel. Many other shorter pieces were written upon request, such
as the mummings, already mentioned, for the mercers and the goldsmiths of
London. Lydgate was the most competent literary handy-man available, and
we should be expecting too much to hope that all his odd jobs should have
been done and his extensive commissions executed with the inspiration of
high art.
Strictly contemporary with Lydgate and an even more devoted admirer of
Chaucer was Thomas Hoccleve (c. 1369c. 1450). From the age of nineteen
or twenty he spent the better part of forty years as a clerk in the Privy Seal
Office. Fortunately he is one of the most autobiographical of English poets.
He was given an annuity of 10 in 1399, and on various occasions when it
was in arrears (as it often was) he appealed in ballades to those who might
expedite its payment. Whatever he received he spent on a merry life, eating
and drinking to excess, haunting the tavern, kissing the girls and paying for
their refreshment, riding on the river and paying the boatmen lavishly, for
the pleasure of being called master. All this he tells us in La Male Regle de
Poetry
to Order
Hoccleve
298
The
Regiment
of Princes
The
Amateurs
T.Hoccleve (c. 1406). He promises there to amend his ways. In any case, a
few years later he married. For a period of five years he suffered from a
nervous breakdown (c. 141520) and, as he says, was mad. In the Complaint
and Dialogue with a friend, which really form a single poem of some 800
lines (c. 14212), he writes at length about his illness and his difficulty in
convincing others of his recovery. About 1425 he seems to have been retired
on a corrody at the priory of Southwick in Hampshire. He was apparently
alive in 1448, but died probably a year or two later.
The bulk of Hoccleves verse is not large, and the range is limited.52 A few
autobiographical pieces, a dozen occasional poems, mostly short, an equal
number of lyrics to the Virgin and Christ, some of them translations, a couple
of tales from the Gesta Romanorum, two short translations (The Letter of
Cupid, Learn to Die), and the Regiment of Princes make up his work. Of
these the longest (5463 lines) is the Regiment of Princes (1412), written for
the young prince who was about to become Henry V. It is the usual advice on
how to live and rule, put together from the De Ludo Scachorum of Jacobus
de Cessolis, the Secreta Secretorum, and the De Regimine Principum of Egidio
Colonna, with a long prefatory section (2000 lines) full of personal allusion.
Hoccleve does not have Lydgates fatal fluency, or Gowers social and moral
urge. He does not write for the sheer love of writing, and he seldom rises to
the level of poetry. Yet his complete frankness, his many personal revelations,
and his frequent references to current events make his verse almost always
interesting. In poets of the fifteenth century, or indeed of later centuries, this
is no small merit.
About the middle of the century we can distinguish a number of amateurs
who hazarded an occasional venture in verse. George Ashby, who lived to
be nearly eighty, and who was for full fourty yere a clerk of the Signet,
left behind him three poems.53 A Prisoners Reflections, written during an
imprisonment in 1463 in the Fleet, is a modest consolation of philosophy in
350 lines of rime royal. His other poems are The Active Policy of a Prince
(918 lines), written for Edward, Prince of Wales, and a paraphrase of some
extracts from the Liber Philosophorum Moralium Antiquorum.54 John
Shirley,55 who died in 1456 at about the age of ninety, is chiefly remembered
as the copyist of a number of manuscripts containing the works of
Chaucer and Lydgate, but wrote two prologues in verse for books which he
compiled. In one of Shirleys manuscripts is preserved the only copy of a
poem of 172 lines called Evidence to Beware and Good Counsel by that
honurable squier, Richard Sellyng.56 Two stanzas attributed in manuscripts
52
It is all printed in Hoccleves Works (EETSES, 61, 72, 73).

George Ashbys Poems, ed. Mary Bateson (1899; EETSES, 76).
54
For other translations of the Diets and Sayings of the Philosophers see below, p. 302.
55
See Otto Gaertner, John Shirley: Sein Leben und Wirken (Halle, 1904) and Hammond, op. cit.
Miss Hammond conjectures that he may have run a bookshop and lending library in London.
56
See Richard Sellyng, by the present writer, in Essays and Studies in Honor of Carleton Brown
(1940), pp. 167181.
53
EBB TIDE
299
to Halsham Esquier have been referred to John Halsham, who died in or

before 1415 owning lands in Sussex, Kent, Norfolk and Wilts.57 None of
these poems is intrinsically important, but they are interesting as suggesting
the extension of literary activity among those not of the literary profession or
the Church.
57
Helen P.South, The Question of Halsam, PMLA, L (1935). 362371.
XXI
Looking Forward
Growth of
a Reading
Public
Prose
Romances
All through the fifteenth century there is growing evidence of the extension of
the reading public.1 That works were being written to be read through the eye
rather than taken in through the ear is apparent not only from the frequency
with which reference is made to reading, but from the length of such poems as
Lydgates Troy Book and the Fall of Princes, which could not conceivably have
been intended for minstrel recitation. The industrial development at this period
and the growth of a landed gentry were accompanied by more widespread
education and the leisure to enjoy it. The new reading public is nowhere more
plainly indicated than in the production of certain late romances very different
in length and character from those of an earlier period. We have already spoken
of the Gest Historiale of the Destruction of Troy with its 14,000 long alliterative
lines.2 More extreme cases are the two Gargantuan poems of the London skinner,
Henry Lovelich. Written about 1425, the Merlin3 reaches a total of 27,852
four-stress lines when the manuscript breaks off, and the History of the Holy
Grail4 runs to nearly 24,000 lines, with an additional section of several thousand
missing in the beginning. On a similar scale two treatments of the Alexander
legend were written in Scotlandone an anonymous poem completed in 1428
in 11,000 lines,5 the other a narrative of about 20,000 verses written by Sir
Gilbert Hay towards the end of the century.6
Growth of the reading public is also shown by the use of prose for works
which would earlier have been written in verse. In this century we witness
the beginning of the prose romance.7 What is apparently the earliest is a
prose Alexander in the Thornton MS (143040),8 but from about the middle
1
On this general subject see the articles of H.S.Bennett, The Author and His Public in the Fourteenth
and Fifteenth Centuries, E&S, XXIII (1938). 724; Caxton and His Public, RES, XIX (1943). 113
119; Science and Information in English Writings of the Fifteenth Century, MLR, XXXIX (1944). 18;
J.W.Adamson, The Extent of Literacy in England in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries: Notes and
Conjectures, Library, 4 Ser., X 1929). 163193; C. L.Kingsford, English Historical Literature in the Fifteenth
Century (1913), and the same authors Prejudice and Promise in Fifteenth Century England (1925).
2
See above, p. 184.
3
Ed. Ernst A.Kock (190432; EETSES, 93, 112; EETS, 185).
4
Ed. F.J.Furnivall (187478; EETSES, 20, 24, 28, 30).
5
Ed. R.L.Graeme Ritchie (4V, 192129; STS, n.s. 12, 17, 21, 25). On the controversy over the
authorship that has raged for fifty years see Ritchies intro., where the presentation of the case for Barbour
is no more conclusive than previous attempts.
6
Only selections have been printed; see A.Hermann, The Forraye of Gadderis; The Vowis (Berlin,
1900).
7
Prose romance might have developed from stories like the Old English Apollonius (see p. 104), but
any such development was cut short by the Norman Conquest.
8
Ed. J.S.Westlake (1913; EETS, 143).
300
LOOKING FORWARD
301
of the century date Pontus and Sidone9 and a very long prose Merlin.10 Of
about the same date are prose condensations of the Troy and Thebes stories in
a Rawlinson MS.11 With the introduction of printing a number of new prose
romances were produced, all of them taken from French originals. Caxton
translated (146971) and printed at Bruges in 1474 or 1475 his Recuyell of
the History es of Troye.12 In England he made and printed translations of
Godeffroy of Boloyne 13 (1481), the story of the siege of Jerusalem in the first
crusade, deriving ultimately from William of Tyre and familiar later in Tassos
Gerusalemme Liberata; the excellent story of Paris and Vienne (1485); Charles
the Great14 (1485), from the French prose Fierabras; The Foure Sonnes of
Aymon15 (c. 1489), recounting Charlemagnes struggle with these valiant nobles;
Blanchardyn and Eglantine16 (c. 1489), a pleasing story reminiscent, in its earlier
part, of the Perceval and involving in the remainder the heros rescue of his
lady from the usual unwelcome suitor. His Eneydos (1490) has been mentioned
in a previous chapter. Malorys great work, which Caxton printed, will be
discussed later. Caxtons practice was followed by his successor Wynkyn de
Worde, who set his apprentice Henry Watson to translating books from the
French. One such is the romance of Valentine and Orson17 printed by him soon
after the turn of the century. Nor did the fashion die with the fifteenth century.
About 1525, Sir John Bourchier, Lord Berners, best known for his translation
of Froissart, occupied his leisure at Calais by turning into English the story of
Huon of Bordeaux,18 loosely connected with the Charlemagne cycle. Many
of these prose romances enjoyed considerable popularity throughout the
sixteenth century, were frequently reprinted, exerted their influence on Spenser
and others, and even furnished material for the Elizabethan drama.
The prose romance, however, is only one type in which the translators
were busy. Translation from the French was, of course, characteristic of
the whole Middle English period, at least from the time of Layamon, and
we have already mentioned a number of works turned into English verse
in die fifteenth century, notably in Lydgates longer poems. At this time
several lesser men were contributing individual pieces to the growing body
of popular books available in the native tongue. John Walton, a canon of
Osney, seems to have succeeded Trevisa as literary purveyor to the Berkeley
family. To him has plausibly been attributed the translation of Vegetius
De Re Militari made in 1408 for Lord Thomas Berkeley, Trevisas former
9
Ed. F.J.Mather, Jr., PMLA, XII (1897), pp. llxvii, 1150.

Ed. Henry B.Wheatley (186569; EETS, 10, 21, 36) with an introduction by Wm. E. Mead
(1899: EETS, 112).
11
The Sege of Troy is edited by N.E.Griffin, PMLA, XXII (1907). 157200; both are printed by
Friedrich Brie, Zwei mittelenglische Prosaromane: The Sege of Thebes und The Sege of Troy, Archiv,
CXXX (1913). 4052, 269285.
12
Ed. H.Oskar Sommer (2V, 1894).
13
Ed. Mary N.Colvin (1893; EETSES, 64).
14
Ed. Sidney J.H.Herrtage (2V, 188081; EETSES, 3637).
15
Ed. Octavia Richardson (2V, 188485; EETSES, 4445).
16
Ed. Leon Kellner (1890; EETSES, 58).
17
Ed. Arthur Dickson (1937; EETS, 204).
18
Ed. S.L.Lee (4V, 188287; EETSES, 40, 41, 43, 50).
10
Other
Prose
302
East
Anglian
Patronage
Scrope
Metham
Burgh
patron,19 and in 1410 he certainly translated for Berkeleys daughter Elizabeth,

who was later to marry the Earl of Warwick, Boethius Consolation of
Philosophy20 into eight-line stanzas and rime royal, with much indebtedness
to Chaucers prose version. Sometime in the earlier part of the century an
anonymous translator turned Palladius on Husbandry 21 also into rime royal.
But in some ways the most interesting group of poet-translators was
that which wrote for a little coterie of East Anglian patrons around the
middle of the century.22 Stephen Scrope (c. 13961472) translated and
presented to his stepfather, Sir John Fastolf, a version in prose of The Dicts
and Sayings of the Philosophers 23 from the French of Tignonville. There
were other translations of the Dicts, the best known of which was that of
Anthony Wydeville, Earl Rivers (after 1473), printed by Caxton. Scrope
also translated from Christine de Pisan The Epistle of Othea to Hector,24 a
variety of courtesy book offering instruction to a prince in the form of a
hundred stories with spiritual and chivalric applications. Later in the century
a second translation was made by Anthony Babyngton.25 Scrope may have
done the translations of Tulle of Old Age printed by Caxton26 and the Boke
of Noblesse,27 more often attributed to William Worcester, Fastolfs secretary,
who is known to have made a revision of Scropes Dicts and Sayings. An
other Norfolk author, John Metham, in addition to treatises on palmistry
and physiognomy, wrote in 14489 for Sir Miles Stapleton and his wife a
poem of 2200 lines in rime royal called Amoryus and Cleopes,28 a variant
of the Pyramus and Thisbe theme loosely associated with the story of
Alexander the Great. Stapleton, prominent in Norfolk affairs, was a friend
and neighbor of Fastolf. Most of the legends of Osbern Bokenham, already
discussed,29 were written for various ladies in Suffolk, including Katherine
Howard, great-grandmother of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, and Lady
Isabel, wife of Henry Bourchier, later Earl of Essex. For the latters sen
Benedict Burgh, mentioned above as the possible continuator of Lydgates
Secrees of Old Philisoffres, wrote a verse paraphrase of the Distichs of
Cato,30 a miscellaneous body of aphorisms on conduct and morals. Finally
19
See Mark Science, as below, pp. xlviiixlix.

Ed. Mark Science (1927; EETS, 170).
21
Ed. Rev. Barton Lodge (187379; EETS, 52, 72).
22
See Samuel Moore, Patrons of Letters in Norfolk and Suffolk, c. 1450, PMLA, XXVII (1912).
188207; XXVIII (1913). 79105.
23
Ed. Margaret E.Schofield (Phila., 1936), with an introduction containing the best account of
Scropes life, and Curt F.Bhler (1941; EETS, 211), who prints also an anonymous translation and
modifications of Scropes translation.
24
Ed. G.F.Warner (1904; Roxburghe Club).
25
Ed. James D.Gordon (Phila., 1942).
26
Ed. Heinz Susebach (Halle, 1933; Studien zur englischen Philologie, 75).
27
Ed. J.Gough Nichols (1860; Roxburghe Club).
28
The Works of John Metham, ed. Hardin Craig (1916; EETS, 132).
29
See p. 289. To Norfolk apparently belongs the translation of Methodius mentioned above, p.
289.
30
The best edition is that of Max Frster, Die Burghsche Cato-Paraphrase, Archiv, CXV (1905).
298323. For Burghs other works see Max Frster, ber Benedict Burghs Leben und Werke, Archiv,
CI (1898). 2964.
20
LOOKING FORWARD
303
we may note that William de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk, husband of Alice Chaucer
and friend of Charles dOrlans, besides being a literary patron wrote ballades
in French and, if the attribution is sound, a small group of poems in English.31
The various persons who thus appear as patrons of letters in Norfolk and Suffolk
were all well known to the Pastons. Many of them appear in the Paston Letters,32
a collection of letters by and to members of this well-known Norfolk family
over a period of three generations (14221509), which, if not literature, are
fascinating for the pictures they give us of life in fifteenth-century England.33
The inference lies close at hand that the growth of a landed gentry and the
rising fortunes of the middle class were having a stimulating effect on certain
types of writing. This inference is borne out by a succession of courtesy books
intended for just such classes.34 There are works belonging to the type known
as parental advice, such as Peter Idleys Instructions to His Son,35 the anonymous
Scottish Ratis Raving,36 both in verse, and the Book of the Knight of La TourLandry, written by the French author (137172) for his daughters, and twice
rendered into English, once about 145037 and again by Caxton in 1484. The
contemporary Babees Book38 offers more limited instructions on social amenities
and the behavior of young people, while John Russells Boke of Nurture, the
work of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucesters marshal, deals comprehensively with
the whole training for service with a nobleman. Even such a collection as the
volume commonly known as the Book of St. Albans, containing treatises on
hawking and heraldry, and one on hunting by Dame Julians Barnes,39 shows
by its frequent reference to gentill men the class to whose interests it appealed.
English prose in the fifteenth century found its most voluminous expression
31
See Henry N.MacCracken, An English Friend of Charles of Orlans, PMLA, XXVI (1911).
142180.
32
Ed. James Gairdner (6V, 1904).
33
Although he was not a part of the Norfolk group, mention should be made of John Tiptoft, Earl
of Worcester, whose translation of Ciceros De Amicitia and Buonaccorsos De Honestate were printed
by Caxton, and to whom other translations are questionably attributed. He was an enthusiast for the
new learning, traveled in Italy buying books, and generously assisted Italian and English scholars. See
R.J.Mitchell, John Tiptoft, 14271470 (1938), and H.B.Lathrop, The Translations of John Tiptoft,
MLN, XLI (1926). 496501. It would be pleasant to pause over the early humanistsGrey, Gunthorpe,
Flemming, and John Free. They are a part of English cultural history, but the importance of humanism
for literature came later. See George R.Stephens, The Knowledge of Greek, in England in the Middle
Ages (Phila., 1933), W.F.Schirmer, Der englische Frhhumanismus (Leipzig, 1931), and R.Weiss,
Humanism in England during the Fifteenth Century (Oxford, 1941).
34
For the different types and a brief sketch of early courtesy literature see ch. I of John E. Mason,
Gentlefolk, in the Making (Phila., 1935).
35
Ed. Charlotte DEvelyn (1935; MLA Monograph Ser., VI).
36
Ed. J.R.Lumby (1870; EETS, 43), and, more recently, R.Girvan (1939; STS, 3rd ser., Vol. XI).
The title is supposed to mean Rates raving.
37
Ed. Thomas Wright (1868, revised 1906; EETS, 33).
38
This and other early courtesy books, including Russells Boke of Nurture are ed. by F.J.Furnivall
(1868; EETS, 32).
39
Julians Barnes was the name of a messuage near St. Albans. Dame Julians was presumably the
wife or widow of the country gentleman who owned it. The familiar designation Dame Juliana Berners
is an invention of eighteenth-century antiquarians, as is the legend that she was abbess of Sopwell
priory. See the introduction to William Blades edition (1901) and the communications of W.W.Skeat
in the Academy, LXXV (1908). 8788, 110111. Much of the Book is based on Twicis Treatise on
Hunting and other earlier works.
Paston
Letters
Courtesy
Literature
304
Pecock
Religious
and
Secular
Works
in the work of Reginald Pecock (c. 1395c. 1460). A brilliant career at Oxford
recommended him to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, who brought him to
court and later secured for him the bishopric of St. Asaph. His active and original
mind was soon employed on numerous expository and controversial works.
The Reule of Crysten Religioun40 (1443) has been well described as the first
book of a summa theologica. The Donet,41 which followed soon afterwards,
serves as an introduction to it and, at the same time, a more general guide to
the Christian life. The Poore Mennes Myrrour is an extract from the first part
of the Donet prepared for the persone poorist in haver (possessions) and in
witt. His most famous work is a systematic attempt to refute by reason, rather
than authority, the views of the Lollards. It is known as the Repressor of Over
Much Blaming of the Clergy42 (c. 1450). Two other treatises remain, the Folewer
of the Donet43 (before 1454), which supplements the Donet with an exposition
of the more intellectual virtues residing in the reason rather than the will, and
The Book of Faith44 (c. 1456), which defends the authority of the Church even
if it be admitted that she can err. While Pecocks position was, generally speaking,
orthodox enough, his daring and often tactless statements played into the hands
of his enemies, and he had a genius for alienating even those who might have
admired his ability and sympathized with his views. In the end his independence
and self-confidence gave his opponents their opportunity and brought about
his condemnation. He was forced to recant, or go to the stake, and he spent
his closing years confined in Thorney abbey without books or writing materials.
Though he escaped the flames, his works nevertheless were burnt, and all six
that survive exist in unique manuscripts. Of late his prose style has come in
for enthusiastic praise, but sober judgment can hardly acquiesce in too high
an estimate of his purely literary importance.
Pecocks contemporary, William Lichfield, who was associated with him
on several occasions, was parson of All Hallows the Great in Thames Street.
He was famous as a preacher and left at his death in 1448, as we learn
from a contemporary record, 3083 sermons. They have not come down to
us, but we have from his hand an interesting version of a portion of the
Ancrent Riwle.45 Other writers at the same time were using prose for secular
subjects. John Capgrave, an Austin friar of Lynn, when he died in 1464
was at work on a Chronicle of England,46 which reaches the year 1417. That
40
Ed. Wm. Cabell Greet (1927; EETS, 171). On Pecock see V.H.H.Green, Bishop Reginald Pecock:
A Study in Ecclesiastical History and Thought (Cambridge, 1945).
41
Ed. Elsie V.Hitchcock (1921; EETS, 156). The name of Donatus, author of the little catechism of
Latin grammar (the Ars Minor) with which everybody began his study of Latin in the Middle Ages,
came to designate a primer or elementary book on any subject.
42
Ed. C.Babington (2V, 1860; Rolls Ser.).
43
Ed. Elsie V.Hitchcock (1924; EETS, 164).
44
Ed. J.L.Morison (Glasgow, 1909), with an excellent essay on Pecocks relation to fifteenth-century
thought.
45
He wrote also a poem called The Complaint of God to Sinful Man (EETS, XV. 198232), preserved
in more than a dozen manuscripts.
46
Ed. F.C.Hingeston (1858; Rolls Ser.). He also wrote in Latin the Nova Legenda Angliac. ed.
C.Horstmann (2V, Oxford, 1901), and, in English, lives of St. Augustine and Gilbert of Sempringham.
LOOKING FORWARD
305
verse, however, was not completely discarded for such purposes is shown by
the Chronicle of John Hardyng,47 whose experience in the battle of Agincourt
unfortunately did not improve his metrical aim. And we may note that while
his best-known work, the De Laudibus Legum Angliae (1471), is in Latin,
Sir John Fortescue, Chief Justice of the Kings Bench, wrote in English On
the Governance of England,48 the first work in English on constitutional
history, and other shorter pieces.
Of all the books of English fifteenth-century literature the best known is
Malorys Morte Darthur, not only because it is still often read in its own
right but because it has furnished the inspiration for the Idylls of the King
and numerous other modern treatments of Arthurian story. Gathering together,
as it does, the main body of Arthurian legends into one comprehensive
narrative, it has enjoyed, except for 2 brief period in the days of Dryden and
Pope, an almost unbroken popularity down to our own time. It is a work
which obviously required much leisure to produce. Therefore, the authors
closing request to his readers, Pray for me, while I am on live that God send
me good deliverance, is not without meaning when properly understood.
For the book, as we now know, was written in prison, where Malory spent
the major part of the last twenty years of his life.
It is only in recent years that we have learned the full story of Sir Thomas
Malory.49 The date of his birth is unknown, but he was the son of a
Warwickshire gentleman who died in 143334. Entering the service of
Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, he was with the Father of Courtesy
at Calais possibly in 1436. He was knighted before 1442 and served in the
Parliament of 1445. By this time he had begun taking the law into his own
hands, after the turbulent manner of his day, and was soon launched on a
career of violence which led to a variety of felonies and misdemeanors,
including assault, extortion, jail breaking, poaching, and a cattle raid. The
two most serious offenses of which he was accused were lying in ambush
with an armed band to murder Humphrey, Duke of Buckingham, and two
attacks on Coombe abbey, in which with a hundred followers he broke
down doors, terrorized the monks, and plundered the abbots chests. For
his various offenses he was kept in fairly continuous confinement from
about 1451 on, and died, presumably in prison, on March 12, 1471. He
was buried near Newgate, in a chapel at the Grey Friars. In view of his life it
47
Ed. Henry Ellis (1812). On Hardyng, see C.L.Kingsford, English Historical Literature in the
Fifteenth Century (Oxford, 1913), ch. VI.
48
Ed. Charles Plummer (Oxford, 1885). See his Works, ed. Lord Clermont (2v, 1869).
49
Our knowledge goes back to an identification made in 1894 by G.L.Kittredge, most fully presented
in Who Was Sir Thomas Malory? Harvard Studies & Notes in Phil. & Lit., v (1896). 85166. A few
details were added in 1922 by E.K.Chambers in his Sir Thomas Malory (English Association Pamphlet,
No. 51). These two discussions led to the discovery of four documents, including a very important
Kings Bench indictment, which became the basis of Edward Hicks, Sir Thomas Malory, His Turbulent
Career (Cambridge, Mass., 1928). A score of additional records were printed by the present writer in
Documenting Sir Thomas Malory, Speculum, VIII (1933). 329. A summary of our knowledge up to
1929 is given in an appendix to Eugne Vinaver, Malory (Oxford, 1929). See also George L.Kittredge,
Sir Thomas Malory (Barnstable, privately printed, 1925).
Malory:
Morte
Darthur
Malorys
Life
306
His
Sources
is interesting to contemplate the profession at the close of the Morte Darthur,

that he was the servant of Jesu both day and night.
It is possible that the nearby house of the Grey Friars, which possessed a
considerable library in Malorys day, supplied him with the books which he
needed to solace his dreary hours in Newgate. For the Morte Darthur these
books need not have been many. The thirteenth century had seen the
compilation in France of long prose versions of the Arthurian stories, such as
the prose Tristan and the cycle known as the Vulgate, or ordinary, version
(made up of the Estoire del Saint Graal, a Merlin and its continuation,50 an
enormous Lancelot, a Queste del Saint Graal, and the Morte Artu) or its
derivative, the Pseudo-Robert de Boron cycle. Such a collection, perhaps in
three or four volumes, was Malorys principal source, although the precise
combination of versions which he based his work on is not found in any
surviving manuscript.51 It is so, too, with his French Tristan, which must be
reconstructed from the characteristics of three different manuscripts among
those we know.52 Malory made use of the alliterative Morte Arthure in English
53
and possibly of the stanzaic Morte Arthur. In general, his method was to
abridge and condense his sources severely, especially by omitting minor
episodes and digressions. The result is a much less discursive narrative, though
it must be admitted that he sometimes left out important incidents and
introduced unnecessary obscurities into his text.
The Morte Darthur was printed in 1485 by Caxton, with some misgivings
about its credibility, and all subsequent editions have been hitherto derived
from his.54 One of the most interesting discoveries of recent years, however,
is that of a manuscript in the Fellows Library of Winchester College,55 which
is independent of Caxtons text and closer to Malorys original. It furnishes
further proof of Malorys identity with the Warwickshire knight, renders
more certain his use of the alliterative Morte Arthure, and makes it clear that
Caxton condensed his text in many places. One may confidently expect that
its publication will give us Malorys work in a still more acceptable form.
In spite of obvious defects the Morte Darthur is a great book. The older
50
Known as the Suite de Merlin or Livre dArtus.

Malorys Merlin, for example, was in part similar to the Huth Merlin, edited by Gaston Paris
and J.Ulrich (2v, 1886; SATF).
52
On this subject see Eugne Vinaver, Le Roman de Tristan et Iseut dans luvre de Thomas
Malory (Paris, 1925), and the same authors Malory, pp. 128154. The latter is the best general
discussion of Malorys sources, replacing that of H.Oskar Sommer in Vol. in of his edition of the
Morte Darthur (1891) and Vida D.Scudder, Le Morte Darthur of Sir Thomas Malory & Its Sources
(1917).
53
See above, p. 191.
54
The most scholarly edition, but still rather inaccurate, is that of H.Oskar Sommer (3V, 1889
91). An excellent text in modernized spelling is that of A.W.Pollard (2v, 1900). That in the Everymans
Library (2v, 1906) is also a good modernized reprint of Caxtons text, and there are of course many
other editions and abridgments.
55
See the communications of W.F.Oakeshott to the London Times, Aug. 25, 1934 and to the LTLS,
Sept. 27, 1934. The manuscript is more fully discussed by Eugne Vinaver, Malorys Morte Darthur
in the Light of a Recent Discovery, Bull, of the John Rylands Library, XIX (1935). 438457. A new
text of Malory based on this manuscript and Caxton, edited by Professor Vinaver, appeared in 1947
under the title The Worlds of Sir Thomas Malory (2ed, 3V, Oxford, 1963).
51
LOOKING FORWARD
307
spirit of courtly love was something Malory either did not understand or
found uncongenial. The romantic charm of his original was partly lost on the
blunt practical nature which our knowledge of his life suggests. But he had a
genuine admiration for knighthood and chivalry, and would have endorsed
the words of Caxton in his preface, that the book was offered to the intent
that noble men may see and learn the noble acts of chivalry, the gentle and
virtuous deeds that some knights used in those days, by which they came to
honor, and how they that were vicious were punished and oft put to shame
and rebuke. Malory was himself a man of action and dispatch, and his style
suggests such a man. He converted the long and involved periods of his French
originals into simple, idiomatic prose. Where his original is diffuse, Malory is
terse and forthright. Yet his short, firm sentences, while they give an impression
of intentional economy, are seldom abrupt, but flow in a naturally modulated
prose rhythm. The style of the Morte Darthur, when all is said and done, is
Malorys greatest distinction, and it is wholly his own. But he has also
preserved for subsequent generations a matchless body of romantic stories
which might otherwise have remained the property of the Middle Ages,
forgotten by modern poets and readers in the English-speaking world, as
they have been forgotten in France.
As a symbol of the spread of English prose in the fifteenth century there
is nothing more indicative than the enormous bulk of William Caxtons56
many translations. A number of these have already been mentioned, but in.
addition to turning French romances into English he translated, generally
from the French, such major works as the Mirrour of the World (1481),
The Golden Legend57 (1483), The Royal Book (1488), besides many titles
only less well known.58 But it is impossible to think of Caxton apart from
his services as Englands first printer, as the man who in 1476 set up the
first printing press in England, who gave the world the Morte Darthur and
put in print the Canterbury Tales. It is as a printer rather than as a writer
that he is primarily remembered. He was a business man who, after a
successful career in the commercial world, turned to the new method
of producing books, and he remains a business man to the end. It is not to
56
Born about 1422 in Kent, he was apprenticed in 1438 to Robert Lange, a London mercer who
became Lord Mayor the following year. Caxton was later admitted to the Mercers Company in 1453.
About 1445 (possibly in 1441) he went abroad and lived for thirty years in the contres of Braband
and Flanders, Holland and Zeland. He became in time governor of the Merchant Adventurers at
Bruges. In the early seventies he learned the art of printing at Cologne, and printed three books abroad.
He seems to have returned to England towards the close of 1476 and set up his press at Westminster.
His publishing (and writing) was done in the last twenty years of his life. His death occurred sometime
in the year 1491. The best recent account of Caxtons life, with new documents, is that of W.J.B.Crotch
in the Introduction to his edition of The Prologues and Epilogues of William Caxton (1928; EETS,
176). William Blades Life and Typography of William Caxton (2V, 2ed., 1882) is a classic work. See
also Seymour de Ricci, A Census of Caxtons (1909; Bibl. Soc., Illustrated Monographs, No. XV),
E.Gordon Duff, William Caxton (1905) and, for a popular treatment, Nellie S. Aurner, Caxton, Mirrour
of Fifteenth-Century Letters (1926).
57
On Caxtons sources see Pierce Butler, Legenda AureaLgende DoreGolden Legend
(Baltimore, 1899), and p. 289, note 10.
58
See A.T.Byles, William Caxton as a Man of Letters, Library, 4 Ser., XV (1934). 125.
Style
and
Spirit
Caxton
308
be doubted that he was genuinely fond of reading, but as a publisher his

approach to literature was practical, and his style has the journeyman quality
of one working at his job. He did not have a natural and instinctive sense of
form. He seems never to have grasped the function of the sentence as a unit
of thought. His ideas, unless controlled by his original, are joined one to
another in a loose and at times unending chain, often without logical or
syntactical cohesion. Compared with Trevisa, or Malory, or even Pecock, he
cannot be said to have advanced the art of English prose. But for making
available to English readers the most popular and useful books of his day
a truly noble five-foot shelfhis service to English culture is inestimable.
Popular
Literature
The
Ballad
In the preceding pages we have been surveying the writings of the fifteenth
century which circulated in manuscripts and printed books. It remains to say
something of the considerable body of popular literature which existed for
the most part only in the memory of the people and which was passed on
from generation to generation by word of mouth. We shall never know how
much of this traditional literature there was, for most of the tales and folk
songs are probably lost. But there is one type of folk song, the popular ballad,
which lived on, and indeed still lives on in Britain and America, and v/hich
has been recorded in modern times to the extent of some three hundred
examples.59 One of the ballads is as old as the thirteenth century and some
originated as late as the seventeenth, but they were clearly flourishing by the
close of the Middle English period and it has become customary in literary
histories to treat them there. They may not unfittingly close our discussion of
the Middle Ages and serve as one of a number of links establishing continuity
with modern times.
The popular ballad is one type of narrative song with certain clearly marked
characteristics which distinguish it from other kinds of poetry. It is composed
in simple stanzas, generally of two or four lines, suitable to a recurrent tune.
Most commonly the stanza consists of alternate four and three stress lines
riming on the second and fourth, as in the opening verse of Sir Patrick Spens:
The king sits in Dumferling toune,
Drinking the blude-red wine:
O whar will I get a guid sailor,
To sail this ship of mine?
The story is usually a single episode, the climax of events only briefly
sketched or hinted at. It begins, as Gray said of Child Maurice, in the
59
The great collection of British ballads is that of F.J.Child, English and Scottish Popular Ballads
(5V, Boston, 188298). An excellent one-volume abridgment is H.C.Sargent and G.L.Kittredge, English
and Scottish Popular Ballads, edited from the Collection of Francis James Child (Boston, 1904), with
an introduction by Kittredge. Among the best discussions of the ballad are F.B.Gummere, The Popular
Ballad (1907), Gordon H.Gerould, The Ballad of Tradition (1932), and, from the Scandinavian point
of view, J.C.H.R.Steenstrup, The Medieval Popular Ballad (Eng. trans., 1914). Of wider scope and
great value is W.J. Entwistle, European Balladry (1939). On the folk tale see Stith Thompson, The
Folktale (1946).
LOOKING FORWARD
309
fifth act of the play. Sometimes the story is revealed in a succession of

brief scenes. The presentation is thus to a high degree dramatic, and the
effect is one of condensation and severe economy. Ballad art is always
objective, with no marks of personal authorship and no attempt to analyze
or interpret the action cr the characters of the story. In many ballads there
is a refrain, and a frequent characteristic is the habit of repeating a stanza
with slight modifications that advance the story, a device Gummere aptly
called incremental repetition. In general the ballad reflects the simple direct
approach to a story characteristic of unlettered people, the people who
through the centuries have made the ballads what they are when they become
known to us.
Most readers of this book will be familiar with some ballads, such as
Edward and Barbara Allen, and will recognize in them the characteristic
tendency to tragedy which the ballads as a whole show. A simple dnouement
often serves the purpose of such a theme, as when in two stanzas the ladies in
Sir Patrick Spens sit hopelessly
Tendency
to
Tragedy
Waiting for thair ain deir lords,

For theyll se thame na mair
or when we are told of Bonnie James Campbell:
Saddled and briddled
and booted rade he;
Toom hame cam the saddle,
but never cam he.
Many of the ballads, like Edward mentioned above, concern domestic
tragedies of one sort or another. In Babylon two out of three sisters are
killed by a young outlaw before he learns from the third that he is their
brother. Two, Sisters is the age-old tragedy of the younger sister preferred
to the elder, while Lord Thomas and Fair Annet tells the equally old story
of the rivalry between wealthy bride and lowly sweetheart. Child Maurice
is doubly tragic in that the husband, thinking to kill his wifes lover, learns
that he has slain her only son. The situation was dramatic enough to be
made in the eighteenth century into Homes tragedy of Douglas. Outraged
propriety leads the cruel brother in the ballad of that name to revenge
himself on his sister on her marriage day, because she forgot to ask his
consent to the marriage:
She leand her oer the saddle-bow,
To give him a kiss ere she did go.
He has taen a knife, baith long and sharp,
And stabbd that bonny bride to the heart.
Love naturally occupies a prominent place in the ballads, and more often
than not it is the sorrow and tragedy of love rather than the happy fulfillment
Love
310
of young hope. Remorse over deserting a sweetheart leads the ballad of Fair
Margaret and Sweet William to a simple, if obvious, conclusion:
Fair Margaret dyd today, today,
Sweet William he dyd the morrow;
Fair Margaret dyd for pure true love,
Sweet William he dyd for sorrow.
The lady in Fair Janet must be separated from her lover, to whom she had
borne a son:
O we maun part this love, Willie,
That has been lang between;
Theres a French lord coming oer the sea,
To wed me wi a ring.
There is a touch of melodrama in the close, when she gets up from child-bed
to go through with the wedding but falls dead while dancing with her true
love. One of the finest examples of the ballad way of telling a story is Lord
Randal. Each stanza follows the same formula:
O where ha you been, Lord Randal, my son?
And where ha you been, my handsome young man?
I ha been at the greenwood; mother, mak my bed soon:
For Im wearied wi hunting, and fain wad lie down.
Outlaw
Life and
Other
Themes
Slowly, in spite of his evasive answers, the mother learns that her son has
been poisoned by the girl he loves. Jealousy and revenge motivate the tragedy
in young Waters and in Young Hunting. Not all the love stories, however,
end tragically. The daring and loyalty of the lady are sometimes rewarded, as
in Young Beichan or The Gay Goshawk. Even seduction, though sometimes
successfully resisted, when carried out does not always end unhappily for
either the seducer or the seduced. A third of all the ballads deal with love,
and naturally net many of the familiar situations fail of treatment.
The ballads reflect, of course, the social conditions of the period and the
region that produced many of them. Border feuds find expression in the
fine ballad of Captain Car and in Kinmont Willier, while two of the most
famous ballads, The Battle of Otterburn and The Hunting of the Cheviot,
tell in different ways the fight between Percy and Douglas which in one
version or the other moved Sir Philip Sidneys heart more than with a
trumpet. There are ballads, too, of outlaw life such as Johnny Armstrong
and Adam Bell, Clim of the Clough, and William of Cloudesly, besides
the group concerned with the more famous Robin Hood. The supernatural
enters into such ballads as Thomas Rymer and Clerk Colvin, whose
adventure with a mermaid proves his undoing.60 Sometimes the ballad
turns journalistic and reports a local event as in Bessie Bell and Mary Gray,
or the sixteenth-century Mary Hamilton, which records the punishment
meted out for a case of child-murder at the court of Mary Queen of Scots. On
60
See Lowry C.Wimberly, Folklore in the English & Scottish Ballads (Chicago, 1928).
LOOKING FORWARD
311
rare occasions the theme is a humorous incident, such as the delightful

revelation of human nature in Get Up and Bar the Door.
Best known probably of all the ballad subjects are Robin Hood and his
carefree yeomen and their varied adventures in the merry greenwood. His
fame was known to the author of Piers Plowman, but how much earlier we
cannot say. He is the peoples counterpart of aristocratic heroes like Sir
Gawain. Courteous, ever ready for an adventure, and with a rough and ready
sense of humor, he is the champion of the weak and the friend of honest
poverty. As an outlaw he is free from the ordinary restraints of law. Though
loyal to the king, he helps himself freely to the kings deer, and levies with a
clear conscience on knights and barons, bishops and abbots, the silver which
he bestows with equal readiness on those who need it. He takes the law into
his own hand and deals out rough justice on the spot, as when in Robin
Hood and Allen a Dale he not only prevents the marriage of Allens sweetheart
to an old man but unites the lovers in a very unecclesiastical ceremony. He
has, of course, the physical virtues which befit the yeoman ideal, such as
uncanny skill with the bow and the long staff, though he often meets his
match and generously acknowledges the superior strength or craft of his
opponent. His life is marked by frequent encounters with the sheriff of
Nottingham, and if he generally comes off from them successfully, not the
least reason is his sincere and unfailing devotion to Our Lady. More than
thirty ballads, some early and some late, recount his lively adventures. By
about 1500, and perhaps earlier, a number of episodes were woven together
into a miniature epic printed as A Gest of Robyn Hode.61
The origin of the ballad is a question on which opinion has gradually
shifted.62 The concept of the folk forming a homogeneous community, with a
common fund of experience and common responses to whatever affects the
community, expressing as a group the emotion felt by all, not only in rhythmic
movement and dance, but in words which result in a record of the event
celebrated, was widely held a generation ago. Das Volk dichtet, it was said,
and with certain modern instances of group composition which could be
pointed to in the Faroe islands, among Negroes in the southern part of the
United States, and elsewhere, it was possible to erect a communal theory for
the origin of the ballad. The refrain, which was considered a primitive
and essential feature of the earliest ballads, could be sung by the group,
while a leader and a few of the more inventive, or more vocal, contributed
most of the verses. Although it would be rash to deny the possibility
that a few of our ballads originated in this way, it cannot be proved, and
such an origin is unlikely in the case of most of the English ballads that
have been preserved. While ballads are doubtless older than our earliest
61
For the literature of the subject see J.Harris Gable, Bibliography of Robin Hood (Lincoln, Neb.,
1939; Univ. of Nebraska Stud, in Lang., Lit., and Crit., No. 17).
62
For the older view see the discussions of Kittredge and Gummere, as above, and F.B. Gummere,
The Ballad and Communal Poetry, Harvard Studies & Notes in Phil. & Lit., v (1896). 4156, and
The Beginnings of Poetry (1901). For the argument against the communal theory see Louise Pound,
Poetic Origins and the Ballad (1921).
Robin
Hood
Ballad
Origins
312
Effects of
Oral
Transmission
Ballad
Tunes
recorded specimen, the Judas found in a late thirteenth-century manuscript,

the English ballads do not reflect so simple a social structure as the communal
theory necessarily assumes.
But if the ballads were not written by the people acting as a group, they
have certainly been rewritten by them, if we may use the word of people who
had seldom learned the use of a pen. In the process of oral transmission over
the centuries the ballads that lived in the memories and on the lips of the
people have been slowly transformed. The numerous versions that have been
collected of some of the more popular ballads show that this transformation
has not always been for the better. But there can be little doubt that in other
cases the selective memory of the people has sifted the matter of a ballad,
dropping out non-essentials and leaving the main features of the incident or
story in greater relief. If the ballad is not communal in origin, it is, as has
been well said, communal in transmission,63 and owes some of its most
distinctive qualities to the genius of the folk.
No one who has not heard ballads sung can have a just appreciation of
their effectiveness. Ballad melodies,64 as traditional as the words, not only
contribute greatly to their appeal but by their slow tempo and leisurely
movement allow each stanza to work its influence on the listener. Ballads
were never meant to be scanned quickly with the eye. When printed in books
they are like museum specimens, interesting and often beautiful, but revealing
only a small part of their true character and charm.65
63
See the discussion of G.H.Gerould, The Making of Ballads, MP, XXI (1923). 1528.
Sigurd B.Hustvedt, A Melodic Index of Childs Ballad Tunes (Berkeley, 1936; Pub. Univ. of
Calif, at Los Angeles in Long, and Lit., Vol. I, No. 2), and the music included in many of the works
mentioned in the following note.
65
British ballads are still being sung in America, particularly in communities more or less isolated,
by the descendants of English and Scotch-Irish settlers who brought them to this country in the eighteenth
century. An excellent collection of such versions, with the music, will be found in Cecil J.Sharp, English
Folk-Songs from the Southern Appalachians (2ed., 2V, 1932). Arthur K.Davis, Jr., Traditional Ballads
of Virginia (Cambridge, Mass., 1929), contains 51 ballads in 650 versions. A similar collection is
Phillips Barry, Fannie H.Eckstorm, and Mary W.Smyth, British Ballads from Maine (New Haven,
1929). Many versions of British and American ballads may be found in Reed Smith, South Carolina
Ballads (Cambridge, Mass., 1928), with interesting evidence of the communal process, John H.Cox,
Folk-Songs of the South (Cambridge, Mass., 1925), Arthur P.Hudson, Folksongs of Mississippi and
Their Background (Chapel Hill, 1936), W.Roy Mackenzie, The Quest of the Ballad (Princeton, 1919)
and Ballads and Sea Songs from Nova Scotia (Cambridge, Mass., 1928), Emelyn E.Gardner and
Geraldine J.Chickering, Ballads and Songs of Southern Michigan (Ann Arbor, 1939). The student
interested in American folk poetry should consult Louise Pound, American Ballads and Songs (1922),
John A.Lomax, Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910; new ed., 1938), John A. and Alan
Lomax, American Ballads and Folk Songs (1934) and Our Singing Country (1941), Carl Sandburg,
The American Songbag (1927), Roland P.Gray, Songs and Ballads of the Maine Lumber Jacks, with
Other Songs from Maine (Cambridge, Mass., 1924), Earl C.Beck, Songs of the Michigan Lumberjacks
(Ann Arbor, 1941), the delightful volumes of Dorothy Scarborough, On the Trail of Negro Folk-Song
(1925), and A Song Catcher in Southern Mountains (1937), and Newman I.White, American Negro
Folk-Songs (Cambridge, Mass., 1928). For further references see Alan Lomax and Sidney R.Cowell,
American Folk Song and Folk Lore: A Regional Bibliography (1942).
64
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL
SUPPLEMENT
Boldface numbers refer to pages in text
BOOK I: THE MIDDLE AGES

Part I. The Old English Period (to 1100)
I. Folk, State, and Speech
3 At this writing the latest book-length survey of the Old English period is
S.B.Greenfields Critical History of Old English Literature (1965), with
generous bibliographical footnotes. See also his bibliography of Old English
in D.M.Zenser, Guide to English Literature(1961). W.Bonsers AngloSaxon
and Celtic Bibliography 450108 7 (Oxford, 1957) excludes all material
dealing with literature and linguistics as such (viii). A second ed. of Stentons
Anglo-Saxon England came out in 1947. See also P.H.Blair, An Introduction
to Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 1956); D.Whitelock, The Beginnings
of English Society (1952); N.R.Ker, Catalogue of MSS Containing AngloSaxon (Oxford, 1957); P.Clemoes (ed.), The Anglo-Saxons (1959); and
K.Sisam, Studies in the History of Old English Literature (Oxford, 1953).
K.Jacksons Language and History in Early Britain (Cambridge, Mass., 1953)
deals chiefly with Celtic matters, as do, in part, C.Fox and B.Dickins (eds.),
The Early Cultures of Northwest Europe (1950). On the Sutton Hoo
archeological finds see C.Green, Sutton Hoo (1963) and the writings listed
by F.P.Magoun and J.B. Bessinger in Speculum, XXIX (1954). 116124 and
XXXIII (1958). 515522 respectively.
4 See also J.Godfrey, The Church in Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge,
1962).
5 A short Old English grammar, with special attention to syntax, is that
of R.Quirk and C.L.Wrenn (1955; 2ed, 1958). A longer one, for more
advanced students, is that of A.Campbell (Oxford, 1959).
11 A fuller sketch of Old English times is that of K.Malone, Emory
University Quar., v (1949). 129148.
II. Anglo-Latin Writings

12 M.L.W.Laistners Thought and Letters in Western Europe A.D. 500900
(2ed., 1957) throws light on Anglo-Latin writers and their sources of
information.
13 On Aldhelm see also E.R.Curtius, Europische Literatur und
Lateinisches Mittelalter (Bern, 1958), pp. 5354, 454455.
15 Two MSS of Bedes Historiaare now available in the series Early
English MSS in Facsimile: the Leningrad MS, ed. O.Arngart, and the Moore
315
316
MS, ed. P.H.Blair (Copenhagen, 1952 and 1959). On Bede see also Curtius,
op. cit., pp. 5455. Bedes Opera de Temporibus have been edited by C.W.Jones
(Cambridge, Mass., 1943). For Bede studies in recent years see W.F.Bolton,
A Bede Bibliography, Traditio, XVIII (1962). 436445.
16 Bedes metrical life of Cuthbert has been edited by W.Jaager (Leipzig,
1935); his prose life, with the anonymous life, by B.Colgrave (Cambridge, 1940).
The Whitby life of Pope Gregory has been translated by C.W.Jones, Saints Lives
and Chronicles in Early England (Ithaca, N.Y. 1947), pp. 95121.
18 Eadmers life of Anselm is now to be had in a separate edition by R.W.
Southern (1963); see also Southerns St Anselm and His Biographer (1963).
The following recent editions are noteworthy: F.Barlow, Vita dwardi Regis
(1962) and A.Campbell, Chronicon thelweardi (1962).
III. The Old Tradition: Poetic Form

20 For the Germanic background see also J.de Vries, Die geistige Welt der
Germanen, (2ed., Hall/Saale, 1945). On speakings, see also H.M.Chadwick,
The Heroic Age (Cambridge, 1912), of which The Growth of Literature is an
expansion. The studies of Mr and Mrs Chadwick were carried further by
Milman Parry in his papers on Homer (see Harvard Stud, in Classical Phil.,
XLI. 73147 and XLIII. 150 and Trans. Amer. Phil. Assoc., LXIV. 179197)
and by Parrys disciple A.B.Lord in The Singer of Tales (Cambridge, Mass.,
1960), a work which, like the Chadwicks book (II. 299456) and Parrys
papers, leans heavily on Yugoslavic speakings. Parrys method in isolating
the set phrases (formulas) of Homeric diction has been applied to Old English
poetry by F.P.Magoun and others, with results still in the stage of learned
debate. See Magouns paper in Speculum, XXVIII (1953). 446467 and
R.Quirks critique in Early English and Norse Studies presented to Hugh Smith
in Honour of his sixtieth Birthday (1963), pp. 150171. The Chadwicks
summed things up as follows (III. 753): The diction of heroic narrative poetry
tends everywhere to abound in static epithets, descriptive circumlocutions,
kennings, repetitions and recurrent formulae. This statement of the case will
doubtless be generally accepted. And Cdmon, the earliest English poet known
to us by name, was an illiterate singer as Bede tells the tale. But it need not
follow that all or even many of the Old English poems committed to writing
were composed by such singers. Cdmons was a special case: his songs were
written down (from dictation) because thought to be divinely inspired, but
speakings as a rule did not win written record. Indeed, why should they? The
clerical poets made free use, naturally enough, of the conventional poetic
diction familiar to them from childhood. In so doing they were following in
the steps of Cdmon, who had turned the native English way of versifying
into a tool for Gods service; see p. 60. But their compositions, made to be
read aloud, were writings, not speakings.
On the runes see R.W.V.Elliott, Runes: An Introduction (Manchester,
1959); K.Schneider, Die germanischen Runennamen (Meisenheim, 1956);
and R. Derolez, Runica Manuscripta (Bruges, 1954).
21 The Franks Casket is better dated in the sixth century. See K.Schneider
in Festschrift fr Walther Fischer (Heidelberg, 1959), pp. 420.
317
23 A more recent metrical study is that of A.J.Bliss, The Metre of Beowulf

(Oxford, 1958); reviewed by W.P.Lehmann in JEGP, LIX (1960). 137142,
by G.Storms in ES, XLVI (1965). 418422.
29 See H.Marquart, Die altenglischen Kenningar (Halle/Saale, 1938);
reviewed in JEGP, XXXVIII (1939). 282285 and MLN, LV (1940). 7374.
30 On the supposed Old English poetic koin see F.Klaeber, Beowulf (3ed,
Boston, 1936). lxxxviii and K.Malone in Revue belge de Philologie et
dHistoire, XLII (1964). 155156.
IV. The Old Tradition: Popular Poetry

32 A second ed. of K.Malones Widsith is now in print (Copenhagen, 1962).
34 On the Runic Poem see K.Schneider, Die germanischen Runennamen
(Meisenheim, 1956), passim.
35 Note also F.E.Harmer, Anglo-Saxon Writs (Manchester, 1952).
38 Grendon has been superseded by G.Storms, Anglo-Saxon Magic (The
Hague, 1948). See also K.Schneider, FestschriftSpira (Heidelberg, 1961),
pp. 3856.
41 K.Schneider takes eorpan modor (rightly, no doubt) for a compound
word; see his Runennamen 605 top. One may compare the fmnanegn of
Beowulf 2059.
43 On words of wisdom in Beowulf see K.Malone, Humaniora, Essays
honoring Archer Taylor (Locust Valley, N.Y., 1960), pp. 180194.
V. The Old Tradition: Courtly Poetry

45 A second ed. of K.Malones Widsith has come out in the series Anglistica
(XIII, Copenhagen, 1962). See also his papers in Festschrift fr
L.L.Hammerich (Copenhagen, 1962), pp. 161167 and Speculum, XXXIX
(1964). 3544.
48 K.Malones Deor is now in its fourth edition (1966). See also
H.Hallmundsson, American-Scandinavian Rev., L (1962). 267271;
M.W.Bloomfield, PMLA, LXXIX (1964). 534541; and N.E.Eliason, SP,
LXII (1965). 495509.
50 From Beowulf 11251128 one gathers that the wealaf after swearing
allegiance to Finn are released by him and take ship for Denmark, all but
Hengest, whom Finn holds (as hostage?); see K.Malone, Festschrift fr
Walther Fischer (Heidelberg, 1959), pp. 13.
57 On Maldon see now CL, XIV (1962). 2335 (by J.B.Bessinger) and
5370 (by R.W.V.Elliott).
VI. Religions Poetry: Cdmon and his School

60 See C.L.Wrenn, The Poetry of Cdmon (1947) and the reviews in MLR,
XLIII (1948). 250252 and MA, XVII (1948). 5657. On Bedes account of
Cdmon see F.P.Magoun, Speculum, XXX (1955). 4963 and K.Malone,
MLN, LXXVI (1961). 193195.
318
61 A later edition of the Old English Exodus is that of E.B.Irving (New Haven,
1953), reviewed by E.V.K.Dobbie in JEGP, LIII (1954). 229231; by S.Potter in
MA, XXV (1956). 3033; and by C.L.Wrenn in RES, VI (1955). 184189.
62 B.F.Hupp in his Doctrine and Poetry: Augustines Influence on Old
English Poetry (Albany, N.Y., 1959) includes a close study of Genesis A. On
Genesis and Exodus see further Anglia, LXX (1952). 285294; LXXV (1957).
134; LXXVII (1959). I-II; and LXXX (1962). 363378.
67 The latest editions of Judith are those of B.J.Timmer (1952) and E.V.K.
Dobbie, in Krapp-Dobbie IV.
68 A tenth-century dating of Judith is now usual: see Timmer, ed., pp. 6
11, Dobbie, ed., p. lxiv, and H.M.Flasdieck, Anglia, LXIX (1950). 270. The
poem as it has come down to us is in the West Saxon dialect, with some
admixture of Anglian forms. These were formerly explained as relics of an
Anglian original but are otherwise accounted for (not very convincingly) by
F.Tupper and his followers; see JEGP, XI (1912). 8289. The theory of a
poetic koin is likewise dubious; see F.Klaeber, Beowulf (3ed.), p. lxxxviii.
VII Religious Poetry: Cynewulf and his School

70 On Cynewulfs poetry see also Marguerite-Marie Dubois, Les lments
Latins dans la Posie Religieuse de Cynewulf (Paris, 1943) and Claes Schaar,
Critical Studies in the Cynewulf Group (Lund, 1949), with K.Malones review
of the latter in Anglia, LXX (1952). 444450. Later editions: R.Woolf, Juliana
(1955) and P.O.E.Gradon, Cynewulfs Elene (1958). The Fates of the Apostles
follows Andreas in the Vercelli Book and the two poems are usually edited
together, though they are otherwise unconnected.
74 On the runic passages of Cynewulfs poems see also R.W.V.Elliotts
paper in ES, XXXIV (1953). 4957 and K.Schneider, Die germanischen
Runennamen (Meisenheim, 1956), pp. 548557.
75 A recent ed. of Andreas and Fates of the Apostles is that of K.R.Brooks,
reviewed by R.Willard in MP, LXII (1963). 4551 and K.Malone, Revue
belge de Philologie et dHistoire, XLII (1964). 154160. An important article
by Hans Schabram, Andreas und Beowulf, Nachrichten der Giessener
Hochschulgesellschaft, XXXIV (1965). 201218, attacks vigorously the view
that the Andreas poet used Beowulf. For Felixs life of Guthlac see now the
definitive ed. by B. Colgrave (Cambridge, 1956).
76 A recent ed. of Phoenix is that of N.F.Blake (Manchester, 1964); see
also his paper in Anglia, LXXX (1962). 5062.
VIII. Religious Poetry: Poems on Various Themes

78 The Dickins-Ross Rood is now in its fourth edition (1963).
79 The Advent poem has now been edited by J.J.Campbell with the title
The Advent Lyrics of the Exeter Book (Princeton, 1959).
81 Doomsday A is to be dated early in the eleventh century according to
Max Frster, Anglia, LXXIII (1955). 7. F.Moss, tudes Germaniques, in
(1948). 157165, argues that Doomsday C had an Old Saxon original.
SECULAR POETRY
319
83 For the passages in Solomon and Saturn (first poem) that incorporate
runes see K.Schneider, op. cit., pp. 558569. On Gifts of Men see J.E.Cross,
Neophilologus, XLVI (1962). 6670. Falseness of Men is called Homiletic
Fragment I in Krapp-Dobbie II. 59 and Admonition is called Homiletic
Fragment II in Krapp-Dobbie in. 224. For Seafarer see now the ed. of
I.L.Gordon (1960). For editions of Wanderer and Riming Poem see KrappDobbie in. 134137 and 166169. On Wanderer and Seafarer see also the
following: D.Whitelock in the Chadwick Memorial Studies, Early Cultures
of N.W.Europe (1950), pp. 259272; R.M.Lumiansky, Neophilologus,
XXXIV (1950). 104112; S.B.Greenfield, JEGP, L (1951). 451465;
E.G.Stanley, Anglia, LXXIII (1955). 413466; G.V.Smithers, MA, XXVI
(1957). 137153 and XXVIII (1959). 122; W.Erzgrber, Festschrift Spira
(1961), pp. 5785; and A.A.Prins, Neophilologus, XLVIII (1964). 237251.
85 It is now fashionable to date Riming Poem, Wanderer, and Seafarer late
or latish and to doubt their Anglian origin; see esp. Mrs. Gordons ed. Seafarer.
But E.Ekwall, Philologica: the Malone Anniversary Studies (1949), p. 28, and
H.M.Flasdieck, Anglia, LXIX (1950). 167171, keep the older view and
strengthen it with new evidence; see also G.V.Smithers, English and Germanic
Stud., IV (19511952). 8485, who favors a latish date but a Northern origin
for Wanderer. The Benedictine Office is now available in an edition by J.Ure;
see Chapter X (Literary Prose) below. For the Paris Psalter see now B.Colgraves
edition in Early English MSS in Facsimile, VIII (Copenhagen, 1958).
IX. Secular Poetry

88 On the date of the Durham Poem see JEGP, LXI (1962). 591594. Ruin
is included in R.F.Leslie (ed.), Three Old English Elegies (Manchester, 1961).
On the riddles, see the following: for text and notes, Krapp-Dobbie in; for
text and translation, the EETS ed. of the Exeter Book; for the Leiden Riddle,
R.W. Zandvoort, English and Germanic Stud., in (19491950). 4256; for
other riddles, Neophilologus, xxx (1946). 126127 , XXXI (1947). 145
158; PMLA, LXI (1946). 620623, 910915, LXII (1947). 18, LXIII (1948).
36, LXIV (1949). 884888; MLN, LXII (1947). 558559, LXV (1950).
93100; Philologica: the Malone Anniversary Studies (1949), pp. 119; MA,
XXI (1952). 3637; SP, XLIX (1952). 553565; ES, XXXV (1954). 259
262; RES, IX (1958). 241252; and MS, XX (1958). 9397.
90 On Eadwacer and Wifes Lament as Old English representatives of
the widespread Frauenlied genre see K.Malone, CL, XIV (1962). 106117.
Wifes Lament is included in R.F.Leslie (ed.), Three Old English Elegies
(Manchester, 1961).
91 Lovers or Husbands Message is included in Leslies book mentioned
above. A.C.Bouman, Patterns in Old EnglishLiterature (Leiden, 1962), tries
to reconstruct a story pattern which, he thinks, underlies Wifes Lament and
Lovers or Husbands Message but his pattern is not convincing, depending
as it does on a reading in the latter poem which R.E.Kaske has shown to be
highly unlikely; see MA, XXXIII (1964). 204206. See also K.Malone, ES,
XLVI (1965). 492493. On the runes in Lovers Message see K.Schneider, Die
germanischen Runennamen (Meisenheim, 1956), pp. 570574.
320
92 A second ed. of Zupitzas Beowulf with new facsimile photographs

and an introductory note (v-xvii) by Norman Davis is now available in the
EETS series, No. 245 (1959). See also Early English MSS in Facsimile, I
(1951) and XII (1963), both edited by K.Malone. Heyne-Schckings Beowulf
(ed. E.von Schaubert) is in its eighteenth edition (1963), and Chambers
Beowulf, An Introduction is in its third (1959), with a supplement by
C.L.Wrenn, whose own Beowulf edition (1953) was issued in revised and
enlarged form in 1958. A good prose translation is that of J.R.Clark Hall,
as revised and annotated by C.L.Wrenn, with a Preface on words and meters
by J.R.R.Tolkien (1940). Critical studies of Beowulf are too many to be
listed here, but the following cannot go without mention: D.Whitelock, The
Audience of Beowulf (Oxford, 1951); K.Sisam, The Structure of Beowulf
(Oxford, 1965); and A.G.Brodeur, The Art of Beowulf (Berkeley, 1959),
reviewed by J.C.Pope in Speculum, XXXVII (1962). 411417, by Ad. Bonjour
in ES, XLIII (1962). 501504, and by K.Malone in MLN, LXXV (1960).
347353. See also Bonjours Twelve Beowulf Papers 19401960(Geneva,
1962), Charles Donahue, Beowulf and Christian Tradition, Traditio, XXI
(1965). 55116, and L.E.Nicholson (ed.), An Anthology of Beowulf Criticism
(South Bend, Indiana, 1963), the last but not the least item of the list.
93 On the date of Beowulf see also G.Bond, SP, XL (1943). 481493 and
H.M.Flasdieck, Anglia, LXIX (1950). 135171; Flasdieck concludes that the
date of the original MS of Beowulf cannot be later than c. 725 and, more probably,
is between 675 and 700 (p. 171). But D.Whitelock, op. cit., contends that the
poem may have been composed as late as the latter half of the eighth century.
X. Literary Prose
96 On English prose before Alfred note R.J.Menners dictum: Prose must have
been cultivated in the Anglian kingdoms before the time of Alfred, (Philological
the Malone Anniversary Studies, p. 56). In the paper from which this dictum is
taken Menner shows that the Blickling homilies were of Anglian origin (they
have come down to us in a tenth-century Saxonized version) but he does not
venture to date their composition. Flasdieck however sees no difficulty in setting
this date as early as the beginning of the 8th c. (Anglia, LXIX. 168).
97 Authoritative translations of the Old English Annals are those of G.N.
Garmonsway, in Everymans Library, No. 624 (1953) and of S.I.Tucker,
edited by D.Whitelock with D.C.Douglas (1961). The editors Introduction
to the latter translation is the latest if not the last word on the origins and
history of the versions. Miss Whitelock also gives us the most recent study
of the Old English Bede, in Proc. Brit. Acad. XLVIII (1963 for 1962). 57
90. The Bodleian MS Hatton 20, with Alfreds translation of Gregorys
Regula Pastoralis, has been published in the series Early English MSS in
Facsimile, VI (Copenhagen, 1956), ed. N.R. Ker, and in the same series (III,
1953) we have the Tollemache Orosius (BM MS Add. 47967), ed.
A.Campbell. This translation has been compared with the Latin text by
S.Potter, Anglia, LXXI (1953). 385437 and by J.Bately, Classicaet
Mediaevalia, XVII (1961). 69105; the latter, who studied a large number
of codices and established many variant readings hitherto unknown to
321
Alfredian scholarship, has shown that Alfred departed from his Latin text
much less often than had previously been thought. On Alfreds Blostman
see S.Potter in Philological the Malone Anniversary Studies (Baltimore, 1949),
PP. 2530. On the West Saxon prose translation of Psalms 150 see now
J.Ia Bromwich, The Early Cultures of Northwest Europe (Cambridge, 1950),
pp. 289303; he tells us that King Alfred has just as good a claim to the
translation of the prose portion of the Paris Psalter as he has to the Cura
Pastoralis and the Boethius (103).
101 lfrics De temporibus anni (in English despite its title) is to be had in
H.Henels ed. of 1942; see C.L.Wrenns review in RES, xx (1944). 232234.
On lfrics rhythmic alliterative prose see esp. O.Funke, Anglia, LXXX (1962).
936 and ES, XLIII (1962). 311318. Marguerite-Marie Duboiss lfric,
Sermonnaire, Docteur et Grammairien (Paris, 1943) is a full-scale study.
103 In recent years much work has been done on Wulfstan. See esp.
D.White-lock (ed.), Sermo Lupi ad Anglos, 3ed. (1963), with bibliography,
which brings Wulfstan scholarship and criticism up to date in the form best
suited to the student. Special mention, besides, must be made of the following:
A.McIntosh, Wulfstans Prose, Proc. Brit. Acad., XXXV (1949). 109
142; K.Jost, Wulfstan studien (Bern, 1950); K.Jost (ed.), Die Institutes of
Polity, Civil and Ecclesiastical (Bern, 1959); D.Bethurum, The Homilies of
Wulfstan (Oxford, 1957); J.Ure, The Benedictine Office(Edinburgh, 1957);
and P.Clemoes, The Old English Benedictine Office in Anglia, LXXVIII
(1960). 265283. The Eliciting Homilies MS (now owned by W.H.Scheide
of Princeton, N.J.) is now to be had in facsimile: Early English MSS in
facsimile, x (Copenhagen, 1960), ed. R.Willard. On the dialect in which the
homilies were composed see above (suppl. to p. 96).
104 A saints life of some importance recently edited (though not for the
first time) is that of St. Chad (Amsterdam, 1953), ed. R.Vleeskruyer; see A.
Campbells review in MA, XXIV (1955). 5256. Of interest, too, is the first
article of the Nowell codex, a fragment of a life of St. Christopher, ed.
S.Rypins (1924; EETS, 161), pp. 6876; see K.Sisam, Studies in the History
of Old English Literature (Oxford, 1953), pp. 6572 and K.Malone (ed.),
The Nowell Codex (Copenhagen, 1963), pp. 114115, 119. Balds Leech
Book, on which Cockayne drew for the second volume of his Leechdoms,
is now available in the series Early English MSS in Facsimile, V (Copenhagen,
1955), ed. C.E.Wright. The Old English Apollonius has been edited by J.Raith
(Munich, 1956) and by P. Goolden (Oxford, 1958).
Part II. The Middle English Period

(11001500)
I. General Characteristics of the Period
109 A new edition of Wells Manual is in preparation under the general
editorship of J.Burke Severs. There are new editions of Renwick and Orton
(1952) and Loomiss Reading List (1948). To the Brown-Robbins Index
there is now a Supplement by Rossell H.Robbins and John Cutler
(Lexington, Ky., 1965) as well as William Ringler, A Bibliography and
322
First-Line Index of English Verse Printed through 1500: A Supplement to

Brown and Robbins Index of Middle English Verse, Papers of the Bibl.
Soc. of America, XLIX (1955). 153180. The texts and editions cited in the
Middle English Dictionary offer a very useful list, available separately: A
Bibliography of Middle English Texts, by Margaret S.Ogden, Charles
E.Palmer, and Richard L.McKelvey (Ann Arbor, 1956). The Annual
Bibliography of English Language and Literature, published by the Modern
Humanities Research Assoc., and the Annual Bibliography compiled by
Paul A.Brown and numerous collaborators for PMLA, which since the issue
for 1956 has been international in scope, are indispensable for all periods of
English literature; the student will find convenient the surveys in The Years
Work in English Studies, issued annually since 1919 by the English Assoc.,
and The Years Work in Modern Language Studies, since 1931, published
by the M.H.R.A. The first issue of Rossell H.Robbins, Middle English
Research in Progress, appeared in Neuphil. Mitteilungen, LXV (1964).
360366, with continuations appearing annually.
110 More recent general surveys of Middle English literature, at least in
part, include H.S.Bennett, Chaucer and the Fifteenth Century (1947) and
E.K. Chambers, English Literature at the Close of the Fifteenth Century
(1946), both in the Oxford History of English Literature; George Kane,
Middle English Literature: A Critical Study of the Romances, the Religious
Lyrics, Piers Plowman (1951); Margaret Schlauch, English Medieval
Literature and Its Social Foundations (Warzawa, 1956); John Speirs,
Medieval English Poetry: The Non-Chaucerian Tradition (1957); The
Pelican Guide to English Literature, ed. Boris Ford: Vol. I: The Age of
Chaucer (1954, rev. 1963). The collected essays of Dorothy Everett, Essays
on Middle English Literature, ed. Patricia Kean (Oxford, 1955), and of
Laura Hibbard Loomis, Adventures in the Middle Ages (1962), gather
together conveniently articles previously scattered. Middle English Survey,
ed. Edward Vasta (Notre Dame, Ind., 1965) is an anthology of critical and
interpretive articles.For the Old French background Paul Zumthor,
Histoire littraire de la France mdivale (Paris, 1954), and Jessie Crosland,
Medieval French Literature (Oxford, 1956), the latter often perceptive in its
critical appraisals, may be consulted. R.Bossuat, Manuel bibliographique
de la littrature franaise du moyen ge (Melun, 1951; two supplements,
Paris, 1955, 1961) is indispensable in spite of many small inaccuracies.
Ernst R.Curtius, European Literature in the Latin Middle Ages, trans.
W.R.Trask (1953; German text, 1948), is broad in range and stimulating.
W.T.H.Jackson, The Literature of the Middle Ages (1960), will help the
student to see English literature in its European context.The historical
background has been enriched by several additional volumes in the Oxford
History of England: Austin L.Poole, From Domesday Book to Magna
Carta, 10871216 (2ed, 1955), F.M.Powicke, The Thirteenth Century
12161307, (2ed, 1962), May McKisack, The Fourteenth Century, 1307
1399 (1959), and E.F.Jacob, The Fifteenth Century, 13991485 (1961). A
revised and rewritten edition of Medieval England is ed. by A.L.Poole (2V,
Oxford, 1958). Two excellent shorter treatments are Doris M.Stenton,
English Society in the Early Middle Ages, 10661307 (2ed, 1952), and
A.R.Myers, England in the Late Middle Ages, 13071536 (1952), both
THE ANCRENE RIWLE
323
Pelican Books. The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, ed. Philip

Grierson (2V, 1952) is an abridgment of the larger work. Indispensable for
the background of much religious literature are Dom David Knowles, The
Monastic Order in England (2ed, Cambridge, 1963), and The Religious
Orders in. England (3v, Cambridge, 194859).
II. The Survival of the Native Tradition

118 The items of R.M.Wilson in note 6 have been incorporated in The Lost
Literature of Medieval England (1952). Cecilia Sisam, The Scribal Tradition
of the Lambeth Homilies RES, n.s. II (1951). 105113, is a valuable study
leading to important general conclusions.
123 Betty Hill, The Luue Ron and Thomas de Hales, MLR, LIX
(1964). 321330, supplies important new data. Thomas of Hales wrote also
in Latin and French. For an Anglo-Norman sermon by him see M.Dominica
Legge, Anglo-Norman Literature and Its Background (Oxford, 1963). Of
great interest for the Katherine Group is the Facsimile of MS Bodley 34: St.
Katherine, St. Margaret, St. Juliana, Hali Meihad, Sawles Warde, ed.
N.R.Ker (1960; EETS, 247).
125 The edition of the St. Juliana by Miss dArdenne mentioned in note
20 has been reprinted (1961; EETS, 248).
126 Additional evidence for Herefordshire is offered by Cecily Clark,
Sawles Warde and Herefordshire, N&Q, cxcix (1954). 140.
III. The Ancrene Riwle

127 The intention of the EETS mentioned in note I is steadily being carried
out. The following MSS have been printed: Cotton MS Nero A. XIV, ed.
Mabel Day (1952; EETS, 225); Gonville and Caius College MS 234/120,
ed. R.M. Wilson, 1954; EETS, 229); BM MS Royal 8 C.I., ed. Albert C.Baugh
(1965; EETS, 232); Corpus Christi College, Cambridge MS 402 (Ancrene
Wisse), ed. J.R.R.Tolkien (1962; EETS, 249); Cotton MS Titus D. XVIII,
ed. Frances M. Mack (1963; EETS, 252); the second French version, from
Trin. Coll., Cambridge MS R. 14. 7, etc., ed. W.H.Trethewey (1958; EETS,
240). See also W.H.Trethewey, The Seven Deadly Sins and the Devils Court
in the Trinity College Cambridge French Text of the Ancrene Riwle PMLA,
LXV (1950). 12331246; John H.Fisher, The French Versions of the Ancrene
Riwle Middle AgesReformationVolkskunde: Festschrift for John
G.Kunstmann (Chapel Hill, 1959; Univ. of No. Carolina Stud, in the
Germanic Lang. and Lit., No. 26), pp. 6574; The Ancrene Riwle: The
Corpus MS. Ancrene Wisse, trans. M.B.Salu (1955; Orchard Books);
E.J.Dobson, The Affiliations of the Manuscripts of Ancrene Wisse, English
and Medieval Studies Presented to J.R.R. Tolkien (1962), pp. 128163;
Charlotte DEvelyn, Notes on Some Interrelations between the Latin and
English Texts of the Ancrene Riwle, PMLA, LXIV (1949). 11641179.
128 That English was the original language of the Ancrene Riwle has
become clear from Miss DEvelyns article just mentioned and especially
from Hans Ksmann, Zur Frage der ursprnglichen Fassung der Ancrene
324
Riwle Anglia, LXXV (1957). 134156. The Tretyse of Loue, ed. John
H.Fisher (1951; EETS, 223), derives in part from the Ancrene Riwle. See
also John H.Fisher, Continental Associations for the Ancrene Riwle PMLA,
LXIV (1949). 11801189.
133 C.H.Talbot, Some Notes on the Dating of the Ancrene Riwle,
Neophilologus, XL (1956). 3850, offers important evidence for dating the
work in the latter half of the twelfth century, possibly the closing years of
the century. Peter Hackett, The Anchoresses Guide, The Month, n.s. XXIII
(1960). 227240, is a sensible survey.
134 e Wohunge of Ure Lauerd, ed. W.Meredith Thompson (1958; EETS,
241).
IV. Anglo-Norman Literature

135 The best treatment of Anglo-Norman literature is now M.Dominica
Legge, Anglo-Norman Literature and its Bac ground (Oxford, 1963), to
which may be added her earlier book, Anglo-Norman in the Cloisters: The
Influence of the Orders upon Anglo-Norman Literature (Edinburgh, 1950;
Edinburgh Univ. Pub.: Lang. & Lit., No. 2). The Dictionnaire des lettres
franaises publi sous la direction du Cardinal Georges Grente. Le Moyen
Age, prpar par R.Bossuat, et al. (Paris, 1964), contains articles (of unequal
value) on all the works mentioned in the present chapter. Much the best
review of the current status of Anglo-Norman scholarship is K.V.Sinclair,
Anglo-Norman Studies: The Last Twenty Years, Australian Jour, of French
Stud., II (1965). 113155, 225278. Ruth J.Dean, A Fair Field Needing
Folk: Anglo-Norman, PMLA, LXIX (1954). 965978, is useful.
136 On Eleanor of Aquitaine see E.R.Labande, Pour une image vridique
dAlinor dAquitaine, Bull. Soc. des Antiquaires de lOuest, 4th Ser., II
(1953). 175234; Rita Le jeune, Rle littraire dAlanor dAquitaine et
de sa famille, Cultura Neolatina, XLV (1954). 557, both being
supplementary to the basic account in Alfred Richard, Histoire des comtes
de Poitou, 7781204 (Paris, 1903), II. 54457. The major part of
W.F.Schirmer and U.Broich, Studien zum literarischen Patronat im England
des 12. Jahrhunderts (Kln, 1962), is the discussion (by Broich) of Henry II
as a literary patron. Florence McCulloch, Medieval Latin and French
Bestiaries (Chapel Hill, 1960; Univ. of No. Carolina Stud, in the Romance
Lang. and Lit., No. 33), may be read in connection with the Bestiaire of
Philippe de Than.
137 The Latin and Anglo-Norman lives of St. Edmund by Matthew Paris
are discussed by C.H.Lawrence in St. Edmund of Abingdon: A Study in
Hagiography and History (Oxford, 1960). Alexander Bell, Notes on Two
Anglo-Norman Saints Lives, PQ, XXXV (1956). 4859, discusses a St.
Osith in the Welbeck Abbey MS and La Passiun de Seint Edmund in a Caius
MS. The Life of St. Catherine by Clemence of Barking is edited by William
Macbain (Oxford, 1964; Anglo-Norman Text Soc., No. 18).
138 Alexander Bell (ed.), LEstoire des Engleis by Geffrei Gaimar (Oxford,
1960; Anglo-Norman Text Soc., Nos. 1415) on which Ronald N.Walpole,
EARLY LATIN WRITERS
325
A New Edition of Geffrei Gaimars LEstoire des Engleis, PQ, XLI (1962).
373385, is a critique.
139 Iain MacDonald, The Chronicle of Jordan Fantosme: Manuscripts,
Author, and Versification, Studies in Medieval French Presented to Alfred
Ewert (Oxford, 1961), pp. 242258. The Chronicle of the Dominican friar
Nicholas Trevet (c. 1335) has not yet been edited. See, however, Ruth J.Dean,
The Manuscripts of Nicholas Trevets Anglo-Norman Chronicles Medievalia
et Humanistica, XIV (1962). 95105. Also pertinent here are Isabel S.T.Aspin
(ed.), Anglo-Norman Political Songs (Oxford, 1953; Anglo-Norman Text Soc.,
No. II) and Carl Selmer (ed.), Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis from Early
Latin MSS (Notre Dame, 1959). R.L.G.Ritchie, The Date of the Voyage of
St. Brendan MA, XIX (1950). 6466, suggests that it was dedicated to Queen
Maud and dates it before May I, 1118, possibly c. 1106.
140 Sister Amelia Klenke has edited Three Saints Lives by Nicholas Bozon
(St. Bonaventure, N.Y., 1947; Franciscan Inst. Pub., Hist. Ser., No. I) and
Seven More Poems by Nicholas Bozon (St. Bonaventure, N.Y., 1951; same
ser, No. 2), the attribution of some of the latter being open to question. In
Nicholas Bozon, MLN, LXIX (1954). 256260, she continues to argue
that Bozon belonged to the diocese of York rather than Lincoln. New data
on Peter of Peckham are given by M.Dominica Legge in La Lumiere as
Laisa Postscript, MLR, XLVI (1951). 191195, and Anglo-Norman in
the Cloisters, pp. 6368. For a summary of and selections (modernized)
from the Lumiere see Charles V. Langlois, La Vie en France au moyen ge
(4V, Paris, 192428), IV. 66119. William of Wadingtons authorship of the
Manuel des Pchs, long considered doubtful, is now generally given up.
The text is being edited for the Anglo-Norman Text Society by E.J.Arnould.
See also Charlton Laird, Character and Growth of the Manuel des Pechiez
Traditio, IV (1946). 253306. Though not mentioned in the text, worth
noting is Henry of Lancasters Livre de Seyntz Medicines (1352), ed.
E.J.Arnould (Oxford, 1940; Anglo-Norman Text Soc., No. 2). Cf. also the
editors study, tude sur le Livre des saintes medecines du duc Henri de
Lancastre (Paris, 1948), and R.W.Ackerman, The Traditional Background
of Lancasters Livre LEsprit Crateur, II (1962). 114118.
141 On Robert de Boron see Mary E.Giffin, A Reading of Robert de
Boron, PMLA, LXXX (1965). 499507. The Romance of Horn by Thomas,
ed. Mildred K. Pope and T.B.W.Reid (2V, Oxford, 195564; Anglo-Norman
Text Soc., Nos. 910, 1213). Brian Foster, The Roman de toute chevalerie:
Its date and author, French Studies, IX (1955). 154158, assigns the romance
to shortly after 1150. E.A.Francis, The Background of Fulk Fitz Warin,
Studies in Medieval French Presented to Alfred Ewert (Oxford, 1961), pp.
322327, may be mentioned.
V. Early Latin Writers

144 On John of Salisbury see Hans Liebeschtz, Medieval Humanism in the
Life and Writings of John of Salisbury (1950; Stud, of the Warburg Inst.,
17), Georg Misch, Studien zur Geschichte der Autobiographie, V: Johann
von Salisbury und das Problem des mittelalterlichen Humanismus (Gttingen,
1960; Nachrichten der Akad. der Wissenschaften in Gttingen, 1960, No.
326
6), and The Metalogicon of John of Salisbury, a Twelfth-Century Defense of

the Verbal and Logical Arts of the Trivium, trans. Daniel D.McGarry
(Berkeley, 1955).
145 Andr Boutemy, Gautier Map, conteur anglais (Brussels, 1945).
146 H.G.Richardson, Gervase of Tilbury, History, XLVI (1961). 102
114, is a good appraisal. For Giraldus Cambrensis should be noted The
First Version of the Topography of Ireland, trans. John J.OMeara (Dundalk,
1951), and Thomas Jones, Gerald the Welshmans Itinerary through Wales
and Description of Wales: An Appreciation and Analysis (Aberystwyth,
1950; also in The National Library of Wales Jour., VI).
147 The Historia Novella by William of Malmesbury and the Gesta
Stephani have both been edited by K.R.Potter (1955) for Nelsons Medieval
Classics.
148 Richard Vaughan, Matthew Paris (Cambridge, 1958; Cambridge Stud,
in Medieval Life and Thought, n.s., vol. 6) is excellent.
149 Geoffrey B.Riddehough, A Forgotten Poet: Joseph of Exeter, JEGP,
XLVI (1947). 254259, and Joseph of Exeter: The Cambridge Manuscript,
Speculum, XXIV (1949). 389396, should be noted. New translations of
some Goliardic poems have been published by the translator, George
F.Whicher, The Goliardic Poets: Medieval Latin Songs and Satires (n.p.,
1949). On Serlo of Wilton see Albert C.Friend, The Proverbs of Serlo of
Wilton, MS, XVI (1954). 179218, and Serlon de Wilton: Pomes latins,
texte critiqueed. Jan berg (Stockholm, 1965; Acta Universitatis: Studia
Latina, XIV). The best treatment of Nigel Wireker (properly Nigel de
Longchamps) is the introduction to A.Boutemy, Nigellus de Longc hamp,
dit Wireker, vol. I (Paris, 1959). The Speculum Stultorum has been edited by
by J.H.Mozley and R.R.Raymo (Berkeley, 1960; Calif. Stud, in English) and
there is now an excellent translation, The Book of Daun Burnel the Ass,
trans. Graydon W.Regenos (Austin, Texas, 1959).
150 Theodore Silverstein, Daniel of Morley, English Cosmogonist and
Student, MS, X (1948). 179196. E.Westacott, Roger Bacon in Life and
Legend (1953), Theodore Crowley, Roger Bacon: The Problem of the Soul
in his Philosophical Writings (Dublin, 1950), Stewart C.Easton, Roger Bacon
and His Search for a Universal Science: A Reconsideration of the Life and
Work of Roger Bacon in the Light of His Own Stated Purposes (Oxford,
1952), and Erich Heck, Roger Bacon: Ein mittelalterlicher Versuch einer
historischen und systematischen Religionswissenschaft (Bonn, 1957, offset
typescript) contribute, each by its own approach, to our understanding of
Bacon. On Ailred of Rievaulx see Amde Hallier, Un ducateur monastique:
Aelred de Rievaulx (Paris, 1959); The Life of Ailred of Rievaulx by Walter
Daniel, trans. F.M.Powicke (1950); and Carleton M.Sage, The Manuscripts
of St. Aelred, Cath. Hist. Rev., XXXIV (1949). 437445. We should now
add to note 19 Sir Maurice Powicke, Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln,
Bull. John Rylands Library, XXXV (1953). 482507, and D.A.Callus (ed.),
Robert Grosseteste, Scholar and Bishop: Essays in Commemoration of the
Seventh Century of His Death (Oxford, 1955). Alfred C.Friend , Master
Odo of Cheriton, Speculum, XXIII (1948). 641658, includes new
biographical material and a consideration of the dates of his works. N.
327
Denholm Young, Richard de Bury (12871345), Trans. Royal Hist. Soc.,

4th Ser., XX (1937), reprinted in his Collected Papers on Mediaeval Subjects
(Oxford, 946), pp. 125, makes significant additions to our knowledge,
especially to the important articles of J.DeGhellinck, Un vque bibliophile
au XIV sicle: Richard Aungerville de Bury (1345), Revue dhistoire
ecclsiastique, XVIII (1922). 271312, 482508; XIX (1923). 157200. New
evidence on the date of Bromyards Summa Predicantium (earlier fourteenth
century) is given in W.A. Pantin, The English Church in the Fourteenth
Century, p. 147.
VI. Wit and Wisdom

153 The work of Arngart has been completed by a second volume (Lund,
1955), containing the texts.
154 Most important is N.R.Kers The Owl and the Nightingale,
reproduced in facsimile from the surviving manuscripts, Jesus Coll. Oxford
29 and B.M. Cotton Caligula A. IX (1963; EETS, 251). The Cotton MS has
been edited by Eric G.Stanley (1960; Nelsons Medieval and Renaissance
Library). There is a verse translation of the poem by Graydon Eggers
(Durham, N.C., 1955). The following items deserve mention: Bertil Sundby,
The Dialect and Provenance of the Middle English Poem The Owl and the
Nightingale: A Linguistic Study (Lund, 1950; Lund Stud, in English, XVIII),
Robert M.Lumiansky, Concerning The Owl and the Nightingale PQ,
XXXII (1953). 411417, and A.C.Cawley, Astrology in The Owl and the
Nightingale, MLR, XLVI (1951). 161174, the last discussing an
astrological allusion possibly bearing on the date of the poem.
VII. For Their Souls Need

158 J.E.Turville-Petre, Studies on the Ormulum MS, JEGP, XLVI (1947).
127, R.W.Burchfield, Ormulum: Words Copied by Jan Van Vliet from
Parts Now Lost, English and Medieval Studies Presented to J.R.R.Tolkien
(1962), pp. 94111, and E.S.Olszewska, Alliterative Phrases in the
Ormulum: Some Norse Parallels, ibid., pp. 112127, are all useful.
162 Nita Scudder Baugh, A Worcestershire Miscellany, Compiled by John
Northwood, c. 1400, ed. from B.M.MS. Add. 37,787 (Philadelphia, 1956),
prints the text of the Body and Soul and explains the hitherto puzzling
disarrangement of the stanzas in this manuscript. Special aspects of the poem
are discussed in Robert W.Ackerman, The Debate of the Body and the Soul
and Parochial Christianity, Speculum, XXXVII (1962). 541565, and Sister
M.Ursula Vogel, Some Aspects of the Horse and Rider Analogy in The Debate
between the Body and the Soul (Washington, D.C., 1948).
VIII. The Arthurian Legend to Layamon

165 The work of Bruce, while still valuable, must now yield to Arthurian
Literature in the Middle Ages: A Collaborative History, ed. Roger S.Loomis
(Oxford, 1959). See also R.S.Loomis, Arthurian Tradition and Chrtien de
Troyes (1949) and The Development of Arthurian Romance (1963); Jean
328
Marx, La lgende arthurienne et le Graal (Paris, 1952) and Nouvelles

recherches sur la littrature arthurienne (Paris, 1965). The annual
bibliography in MLQ, begun by J.J.Parry and continued by Paul A.Brown
was discontinued in 1963; the best current guide to Arthurian scholarship is
the annual Bulletin bibliographique de la Socit Internationale Arthurienne
(Paris, in prog.). To note 2 should be added The Continuations of the Old
French Perceval of Chrtien de Troyes: The First Continuation, ed. William
Roach (3v in 4 to date, Philadelphia, 194955).
167 The Mabinogion should now be read in the scholarly translation of
Gwyn and Thomas Jones (1950). On the historicity of Arthur and the
beginnings see Thomas Jones, The Early Evolution of the Legend of Arthur,
Nottingham Mediaeval Stud., VIII (1964). 421; John J.Parry, The
Historical Arthur, JEGP, LVIII (1959). 365379, which makes some useful
points; William A.Nitze, Arthurian Names: Arthur, PMLA, LXIV (1949).
585596, 1235.
169 A Variant Version of the Historia Regum Britanniae was edited by
Jacob Hammer (Cambridge, Mass., 1951). On the date of this version see
Robert A. Caldwell, Waces Roman de Brut and the Variant Version of
Geoffrey of Monmouths Historia Regum Britanniae Speculum, XXXI
(1956). 675682. For a full discussion of Geoffrey of Monmouth see
J.S.P.Tatlock, The Legendary History of Britain: Geoffrey of Monmouths
Historia Regum Britanniae and Its Early Vernacular Version (Berkeley, 1950).
170 On Wace see Michel de Roard, A propos des sources du Roman de
Rou, Recueil de Travaux offert M.Clovis Brunel (2v, Paris, 1955), I. 178
182, Urban T.Holmes, Jr., Norman Literature and Wace, in Medieval
Secular Literature: Four Essays, ed. William Matthews (Berkeley, 1965),
and Elspeth Yeo, Waces Roman de Brut: A Newly Discovered Fragment,
Manuscripta, VIII (1964). 101104. A new edition of Layamons Brut, ed.
G.L.Brook and R.F.Leslie, Vol. I [to line 8020] (1963; EETS, 250). See also
W.J.Keith, Lazamons Brut: The Literary Differences between between the
Two Texts, MA, XXIX (1960). 161172, and Herbert Pilch, Lazamons
Brut: Eine literarische Studie (Heidelberg, 1960; Anglistische Forsch., 91).
IX. The Romance: I

173 The following items concern the Middle English romances generally:
Karl Brunner, Middle English Metrical Romances and Their Audience,
Studies in Medieval Literature, ed. MacEdward Leach (Philadelphia, 1961),
pp. 219227 (inferences drawn from the character of the MSS) and Die
berlieferungen der mittelenglischen Versromanzen, Anglia, LXXVI (1958).
6473 (interesting statistics on the dates and the number of the MSS); Dieter
Mehl, Die krzeren mittelenglischen Romanzen und die Gattungsfrage,
Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift fr Litteraturwissenschaft und Geistesgeschichte,
XXXVIII (1964). 513533; Albert C.Baugh, The Authorship of the Middle
English Romances, Annual Bull, of the Modern Humanities Research Assoc.,
No. 22 (1950). 1328 and Improvisation in the Middle English Romance,
Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc., CIII (1959). 418454; Gerald Bordman,
THE ROMANCE: II
329
Motif-Index of the English Metrical Romances (Helsinki, 1963; FF Com.,

vol. 79, no. 190).
175 D.M.Hill, An Interpretation of King Horn Anglia, LXXV (1957).
157172, finds symbolism in the poem; Charles W.Dunn, Havelok and
Anlaf Cuaran, Franciplegius: Medieval and Linguistic Studies in Honor of
Francis Peabody Magoun, Jr. (1965), pp. 244249.
181 On the legend of Alexander see George Cary, The Medieval Alexander
(Cambridge, 1956).
X. The Romance: II
189 The English Arthurian romances in alliterative verse are discussed by
J.L.N.OLoughlin in Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages, ed. Roger S.
Loomis (Oxford, 1959), pp. 520527, the others by Robert W.Ackerman,
ibid., pp. 480519. Ackerman has also published a most useful Index of the
Arthurian Names in Middle English (Stanford, 1952; Stanford Univ. Pub.,
Univ. Ser., Lang. and Lit., x). On the short poem known as Arthur see
J.Finlayson, The Source of Arthur, an Early Fifteenth-Century Verse
Chronicle, N&Q, ccv (1960). 4647, who finds that the principal source
is Wace.
190 Ywain and Gawain has been edited by A.B.Friedman and
N.T.Harrington (1964; EETS, 254). Sir Gawain and the Carl of Carlisle has
been twice edited: by Robert W.Ackerman (Ann Arbor, 1947; Univ. of
Michigan Contrib. in Mod. Phil., No. 8) and by Auvo Kurvinen (Helsinki,
1951; Annales Academiae Scientiarum Fennicae, Ser. B, vol. 71, pt. 2).
M.Mills, A Mediaeval Reviser at Work, MA, XXXII (1963). 1123,
concerns Libeaus Desconus.
191 William Matthews, The Tragedy of Arthur: A Study of the Alliterative
Morte Arthure (Berkeley, 1960); Angus McIntosh, The Textual
Transmission of the Alliterative Morte Arthure English and Medieval Studies
Presented to J.R.R.Tolkien (1962), pp. 231240. William A.Nitze, Perceval
and the Holy Grail (Berkeley, 1949; Univ. of Calif. Pub. in Mod. Phil., vol.
28, no. 5).
192 Thomas C.Rumble, The Middle English Sir Tristrem: Toward A
Reappraisal, Compar. Lit., XI (1959). 221228.
193 Mabel VanDuzee, A Medieval Romance of FriendshipEger and
Grime (1963) is a study of the romance.
194 Charles W.Dunn, The Foundling and the Werwolf: A LiteraryHistorical Study of Guillaume de Palerne (Toronto, 1960). L.F.Casson, The
Romance of Sir Degrevant: A Parallel-Text Edition (1949; EETS, 221).
195 Robert J.Geist, Notes on The King of Tars, JEGP, XLVII (1948).
173178, studies the relationship of the MSS and the dialect. Thomas
C.Rumble, The Breton Lays in Middle English (Detroit, 1965), is a welcome
edition of the principal texts. G.V.Smithers, Story-Patterns in Some Breton
Lays, MA, XXII (1953). 6192, is concerned especially with English
examples.
196 William C.Stokoe, Jr., The Double Problem of Sir Degar, PMLA
,
LXX (1955). 518534, corrects the views set forth by Faust and in the still
330
earlier study of Clark H.Slover, Sire Degarre: A Study of a Mediaeval Hack

Writers Methods (Austin, Texas, 1931; Univ. of Texas Stud, in English,
No. II). Mention should be made of the edition of Sir De gare by Gustav
Schliech (Heidel berg, 1929; Englische Textbibliothek, XIX), based on all
the MSS. A.J.Bliss (ed.), Sir Launfal (1960; Nelsons Medieval and
Renaissance Library) contains also Sir Landevale and Maries Lanval in the
Appendix. See also M.Mills, The Composition and Style of the Southern
Octavian, Sir Launfal and Libeaus Desconus MA, XXXI (1962). 88109.
On Sir Orfeo see the edition of A.J.Bliss (Oxford, 1954); J.Burke Severs,
The Antecedents of Sir Orfeo Studies in Medieval Literature, ed.
MacEdward Leach (Philadelphia, 1961), pp. 187207; D.M.Hill, The
Structure of Sir Orfeo MS, XXIII (1961). 136153; Dorena Allen, Orpheus
and Orfeo: The Dead and the Taken, MA, XXXIII (1964). 102111, an
interesting theory that the romance represents the classical story as
understood by a Celt and represents it in the light of Celtic popular beliefs;
B. Mitchell, The Faery World of Sir Orfeo, Neophilologus, XLVIII (1964).
155159.
198 Beverly Boyd (ed.), The Middle English Miracles of the Virgin (San
Marino, Calif., 1964; Huntington Library Pub.). See also R.W.Southern,
The English Origins of the Miracles of the Virgin, Medieval and Renais.
Stud., IV (1958). 176216, and Harold F.Folland, Our Lady and Her
Miracles, Western Humanities Rev., in (1949). 285302. Two additional
studies of the fabliau should now be consulted: Per Nykrog, Les Fabliaux:
tude dhistoire littraire et de stylistique mdivale (Copenhagen, 1957),
and Jean Rychner, Contributions ltude des fabliaux: Variantes,
remaniements, dgradations (2v, Geneva, 1960).
XI. The, Omnibus of Religion

200 A number of the works treated in this chapter are considered in W.A.
Pantin, The English Church in the Fourteenth Century (Cambridge, 1955),
chap, x: Religious and Moral Treatises in the Vernacular. See also Morton
W. Bloomfield, The Seven Deadly Sins: An Introduction to the History of a
Religious Concept (East Lansing, 1952).
202 On John Peckham and his Constitutions see Decima L.Douie,
Archbishop Pecham (Oxford, 1952).
204 D.W.Robertson, Jr., The Cultural Tradition of Handlyng Synne
Speculum, XXII (1947). 162185.
206 Philip Buehler, The Cursor Mundi and Hermans BibleSome
Additional Parallels, SP, LXI (1964). 485499; Henning Larsen, Origo
Crucis, in If by Your Art (Hunt Festschrift, 1948), pp. 2733; Paul
E.Beichner, The Cursor Mundi and Petrus Riga, Speculum, XXIV (1949).
239250; J.J.Lamberts, The Noah Story in Cursor Mundi (vv. 1625
1916), MS, XXIV (1962), 217232, is an attempt at a critical edition of
this portion. An edition of The South English Legendary has been published
by Charlotte DEvelyn and Anna J.Mill (3V, 19569; EETS, 235, 236, 241).
See also Beverly Boyd, New Light on The South English Legendary Texas
Stud, in English, XXXVII (1958). 187194, and Theodor Wolpers, Die
THE LYRIC
331
englische Heiligenlegende des Mittelalters: Eine Formgeschichte des

Legendenerzhlens von der sptantiken lateinischen Tradition bis zur Mitte
des 16. Jahrhunderts (Tbingen, 1964; Anglia Beireihe, 10). After a lapse of
many years the edition of an early fifteenth-century Biblical paraphrase is
being completed and deserves mention: A Middle English Metrical
Paraphrase of the Old Testament, ed. H.Kalen and U.Ohlander (Vols, I-IV,
Gteborg, 192263; the last three volumes are in Gothenburg Stud, in
English). See also Urban Ohlander, Old French Parallels to a Middle
English Metrical Paraphrase of the Old Testament, Gothenburg Stud, in
English, XIV (1962). 203224.
XII. The Lyric

208 The following discussions and editions may be noted: Arthur K.Moore,
The Secular Lyric in Middle English (Lexington, Ky., 1951); Rossell
H.Robbins (ed.), Secular Lyrics of the XIVth and XVth Centuries (2ed,
Oxford, 1955); the same editors Historical Poems of the XIVth and XVth
Centuries (1959); Henry A.Person (ed.), Cambridge Middle English Lyrics
(2ed, Seattle, 1962), seventy lyrics from MSS in Cambridge college libraries;
R.T.Davies (ed.), Medieval English Lyrics: A Critical Anthology (1963); Nita
Scudder Baugh (ed.), A Worcestershire Miscellany Compiled by John North
wood, c. 1400, from B.M.Add. MS 37,787 (Philadelphia, 1956), a collection
of religious pieces, mostly lyrical. See also Rossell H.Robbins, Middle
English Lyrics: Handlist of New Texts, Anglia, LXXXIII (1965). 3547.
209 On the sources of the vernacular lyric see Peter Dronke, Medieval
Latin and the Rise of European Love-Lyric (Cambridge, 1965).
211 For the student who wishes to explore further the convention of
Courtly Love, the starting point is the treatise De Amore of Andreas
Capellanus (c. 1185), ed. E.Trojel (Copenhagen, 1892), English translation
by John J.Parry, The Art of Courtly Love (1941). See also Alexander
J.Denomy. The Heresy of Courtly Love (1947), D.W.Robertson, Jr., The
Subject of the De Amore of Andreas Capellanus, MP, L (1953). 145161,
and Don K.Frank, The Corporeal, the Derogatory and the Stress on Equality
in Andreas De Amore, Medievalia et Humanistica, XVI (1964). 3038.
Courtly love, as implied in the text, is illicit, the devotion of the lover to a
married woman, exemplified by the relations of Lancelot and Guinevere.
213 Most welcome is the Facsimile of British Museum MS. Harley 2253,
with intro. by N.R.Ker (1965; EETS, 255). Also to be noted are G.D.Brook
(ed.), The Harley Lyrics: The Middle English Lyrics of MS. Harley 2253
(Manchester, 1948) and the important article of Theo. Stemmler, Zur
Datierung des MS. Harley 2253, Anglia, LXXX (1962). 111118, which
draws some of its best evidence from an unpublished M.A. thesis by
J.A.Gibson (Univ. of London). Political and other allusions require a date
about 1340. The Leominster origin rests on dubious evidence (see Ker).
215 Bukofzers contention has been seriously challenged by B.Schofield,
The Provenance and Date of Sumer is Icumen in, Music Rev., IX (1948).
8186. For the religious lyric see Stephen Manning, Wisdom and Number:
Toward a Critical Appraisal of the Middle English Religious Lyric (Lincoln,
Neb., 1962); Sister M.Aquinas Chester, The Latin Hymn and the Middle
332
English Lyric, Papers of the Michigan Acad., XL (1954). 271283; Ruth

E.Messenger, The Medieval Latin Hymn (Washington, D.C., 1953); Theodor
Wolpers, Geschichte der englischen Marienlyrik im Mittelalter, Anglia, LXIX
(1950). 388.
221 On the carol: Richard L.Greene (ed.), A Selection of English Carols
(Oxford, 1962); Rossell H.Robbins (ed.), Early English Christmas Carols
(1961); The Middle English Carol Corpus: Some Additions, MLN, LXXIV
(1959). 198208, and Friar Herbert and the Carol, Anglia, LXXV (1957).
194198; J.Copley, The 15th Century Carol and Christmas, N&Q, CXCIX
(1954). 242243, and John Audelays Carols and Music, ES, XXXIX
(1958). 207212; and Richard L.Greene, The Meaning of the Corpus Christi
Carol, MA, XXIX (1960). 1021.
XIII. Richard Rolle and Other Mystics

225 Hilda Graef, The Light and the Rainbow (1959) traces the history of
mysticism from Old Testament times to the late Middle Ages. Shorter surveys
are Gerard Sitwell, Medieval Spiritual Writers (1961) and Ray C.Petry, Late
Medieval Mysticism (Philadelphia, 1957).
226 For English mysticism see David Knowles, The English Mystical
Tradition (1961), Conrad Pepler, The English Religious Heritage (1958),
Richard M.Wilson, Three Middle English Mystics [Rolle, Julian of Norwich,
Margery Kemp], E&S, n.s. IX (1956). 87112, and Eric Colledge, The
Medieval Mystics of England (1962), the last a book of selections with short
introductions.
227 An important Rolle text is now available for the first time, the Melos
Amoris, ed. E.J.F.Arnould (Oxford, 1957). The editors Richard Rolle of
Hampole, The Month, n.s. XXIII (1960). 1325, is an excellent brief
account.
228 The text of the Incendium Amoris is available in two editions: The
Incendium Amoris of Richard Rolle, ed. Margaret Deanesly (Manchester,
1915; Pub. of the Univ. of Manchester, Hist. Ser., No. XXVI) and Dom
N.Noetinger, Le Feu de lAmour, le Modle de la Vie Parfaite, le Pater, par
Richard Rolle de Hampole (Tours, 1928). The De Emendatione Vitae should
be consulted in the edition of Leopold Denis, Du Pch lamour divin ou
lAmendement du Pcheur (Paris, 1926). See also Margery M.Morgan,
Versions of the Meditations on the Passion Ascribed to Richard Rolle,
MA, XXII (1953). 93103.
229 Two additional translations of The Cloud of Unknowing have
appeared, one by Ira Progoff (1959), the other by Clifton Wolters (1961;
Penguin Books). Deonise Hid Diuinite and Other Treatises on Contemplative
Prayer Related to The Cloud of Unknowing, ed. Phyllis Hodgson (1955;
EETS, 231). Miss Hodgson in Walter Hilton and The Cloud of Unknowing:
A Problem of Authorship Reconsidered, MLR, L (1955). 395406,
concludes that the Cloud is not by Hilton. There are two additional
translations of Hiltons principal work: The Scale of Perfection, trans. Gerard
Sitwell (1953; Orchard Books), and The Ladder of Perfection, trans. Leo
Sherley-Price (1957; Penguin Books). Cf. S.S.Hussey, The Text of The Scale
of Perfection, Book II, Neuphil Mitt., LXV (1964). 7592. Attributed to
333
Hilton is The Goad of Love: An Unpublished Translation of the Stimulus

Amoris formerly attributed to St. Bonaventura, ed. Clare Kirchberger (1952).
230 For Julian of Norwich the, following items should be noted: The
Revelations of Divine Love, trans. James Walsh (1961; Orchard Books); A
Shewing of Gods Love: The Shorter Version of Sixteen Revelations, ed.
Sister Anna M. Reynolds (modernized) (1958); P.Franklin Chambers, Juliana
of Norwich: An Introductory Appreciation and an Interpretative Anthology
(1955); Paul Molinari, Julian of Norwich: The Teaching of a 14th Century
English Mystic (1958); Anna M.Reynolds, Julian of Norwich, The Month,
XXIV (1960). 133144. Katharine Cholmley, Margery Kempe: Genius and
Mystic (1947) may be added to the references in note 15.
XIV. The Alliterative Revival

233 On the Pearl poet the following should be noted: Henry L.Savage, The
Gawain Poet: Studies in His Personality and Background (Chapel Hill, 1956);
The Complete Worlds of the Gawain-Poet, in a Modern Version with a
Critical Introduction, by John Gardner (Chicago, 1965); Coolidge
O.Chapman, An Index of Names in Pearl, Purity, Patience, and Gawain
(Ithaca, N.Y., 1951; Cornell Stud, in English, XXXVIII). There is an edition
of Pearl by E.V.Gordon (Oxford, 1953) and an edition with translation and
interpretation by Sister M.Vincent Hillmann (Convent Station, N.J., 1961).
Among many attempts at explanation and interpretation may be mentioned:
Milton R.Stern, An Approach to The Pearl, JEPG, LIV (1955). 684692;
John Conley, Pearl and a Lost Tradition, ibid., 332347; Marie P.Hamilton,
The Meaning of the Middle English Pearl PMLA, LXX (1955). 805824;
Stanton D.Hoffman, The Pearl: Notes for an Interpretation, MP, LVIII
(1960). 7380; F.E.Richardson, The Pearl: A Poem and Its Audience,
Neophilologus, XLVI (1962). 308316; H. Pilch, Das mittelenglische
Perlengedicht, Neuphil. Mitt., LXV (1964). 427446; Robert W.Ackerman,
The Pearl-Maiden and the Penny, Romance Phil., XVII (1964). 615623;
C.Carson, Aspects of Elegy in the Middle English Pearl SP, LXII (1965).
1727; A.R.Heiseman, The Plot of Pearl, PMLA, LXXX (1965). 164
171; P.M.Kean, Numerical Composition in Pearl N&Q, CCX (1965).
4951, the last considering the problem of the extra stanza.
235 John W.Clark, Observations on Certain Differences in Vocabulary
between Cleanness and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight PQ, XXVIII
(1949). 261273. Charles Moorman, The Role of Narrator in Patience
MP, LXI (1963). 9095.
236 Much has been written in recent years about the meaning of Sir
Gawain and the Green Knight, finding a particular allegory or symbolism
by emphasizing one or another feature of the poem. Only a limited number
of articles can be listed here: John Speirs, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight,
Scrutiny, XVI (1949). 274300; D.E.Baughan, The Role of Morgan le
Fay, ELH, XVII (1950). 241251; G.J.Englehardt, The Predicament of
Gawain, MLQ, XVI (1955). 218225; Alan M.Markman, The Meaning
of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight PMLA, LXXII (1957). 574586; Laura
H.Loomiss general survey in Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages, ed.
R.S.Loomis (Oxford, 1959), pp. 528540; S.R.T.O.DArdenne, The Green
334
Count and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, RES, n.s. x (1959). 113
126, the Green Count being Amadeus VI, Count of Savoy (133483); Hans
Schnyder, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: An Essay in Interpretation
(Bern, 1961), exemplifying the exegetical approach, to which M.Mills,
Christian Significance and Romance Tradition in Sir Gawain and the Green
Knight MLR, LX (1965) 483493 is a useful caveat; Morton W.Bloomfield,
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: An Appraisal, PMLA, LXXVI (1961).
719; Larry D.Benson, The Source of the Beheading Episode in Sir Gawain
and the Green Knight, MP, LIX (1961). 112; Marie Borroff, Sir Gawain
and the Green Knight: A Stylistic and Metrical Study (New Haven, 1962;
Yale Stud, in English, 152); G.V.Smithers, What Sir Gawain and the Green
Knight is about, MA, XXXII (1963). 171189, with which may be read
John Burrow, The Two Confession Scenes in Sir Gawain and the Green
Knight MP, LVII (1959). 7379; R.H.Bowers, Gawain and the Green
Knight as Entertainment, MLQ, XXIV (1963). 333341; R.G.Cook, The
Play-Element in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Tulane Stud, in English,
XIII (1963). 531; Mother Angela Carson, The Green Chapel: Its Meaning
and Its Function, SP, LX (1963). 598605; David F.Hills, Gawains Fault
in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, RES, n.s. XIV (1963). 124131;
Stephen Manning, A psychological Interpretation of Sir Gawain and the
Green Knight, Criticism, VI (1964). 165177; Theodore Silverstein, The
Art of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, UTQ, XXXIII (1964). 258278;
Larry D.Benson, Art and Tradition in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
(New Brunswick, N.J., 1965); T.McAlindon, Magic, Fate, and Providence
in Medieval Narrative and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, RES, n.s.
XVI (1965). 121139, which relates the poem to the tradition of Christian
hero and magical opposition. See also Larry D.Benson, The Authorship of
St. Erkenwald, JEGP, LXIV (1965). 393405.
XV. Piers Plowman and Other Alliterative Poems

240 On the literature of social protest in general see John D.Peter, Complaint
and Satire in Early English Literature (Oxford, 1956) and Rossell H.Robbins,
Middle English Poems of Protest, Anglia, LXXVIII (1960). 193203. To
note I should also be added T.W.Ross, On the Evil Times of Edward II: A
New Version from MS. Bodley 48, Anglia, LXXV (1957). 173193. Jerry
D.James, The Undercutting of Conventions in Wynnere and Wastoure,
MLQ, XXV (1964). 243258, sees irony and humor as important stylistic
features of the poem.
241 There is a new edition of The Parlement of the Three Ages by M.Y.
Offord (1959; EETS, 246). Since note 7 was originally written two new
editions of the A-text of Piers Plowman have appeared: Piers the Plowman:
A Critical Edition of the A-Version, ed. Thomas A.Knott and David C.Fowler
(Baltimore, 1952), and Piers Plowman. Vol. I: The A-version: Wills Visions
of Piers Plowman and Do-Well. An edition in the form of Trinity College,
Cambridge, MS. R. 3. 14 corrected from other manuscripts with variant
readings, by G.Kane (1960). The translation by Henry W.Wells has been
reissued (1959) and a new translation by J.F.Goodridge has been published
(1959; Penguin Books).
CHAUCER: I
335
246 J.R.Hulbert, Piers the Plowman after Forty Years, MP, XLV (1948).
215225, challenges R.W.Chambers arguments for unity of authorship. Other
discussions of the three versions include: A.G.Mitchell and G.H.Russell, The
Three Texts of Piers the Plowman JEGP, LII (1953). 445456; B.F.Hupp,
The Authorship of the A and B Texts of Piers Plowman, Speculum, XXII
(1947). 578620; David C.Fowler, Piers the Plowman: Literary Relations of
the A and B Texts (Seattle, 1961; Univ. of Wash. Pub. in Lang. and Lit., 16);
Gordon H. Gerould, The Structural Integrity of Piers Plowman B, SP, XLV
(1948). 6075; T.P.Dunning, The Structure of the B-Text of Piers Plowman,
RES, n.s. VII (1956). 225237; E.Talbot Donaldson, Piers Plowman: The CText and its Poet (New Haven, 1959; Yale Stud, in English, 113); and the
same authors Langland on the Incarnation, ibid., n.s. XVI (1965). 349
363; Willi Erzgrber, William Langlands Piers Plowman (Eine Interpretation
des C-Textes) (Heidelberg, 1957; Frankfurter Arbeiten aus dem Gebiete der
Anglistik u. der AmerikaStudien, 3); G.Kane, Piers Plowman: The Evidence
for Authorship (1965).
247 Critical and interpretive studies: D.W.Robertson and Bernard
F.Hupp, Piers Plowman and Scriptural Tradition (Princeton, 1951; Princeton
Stud, in English, 31); S.S.Hussey, Langland, Hilton, and the Three Lives,
RES, n.s. VII (1956). 132150; Robert W.Frank, Jr., Piers Plowman and
the Scheme of Salvation: An Interpretation of Dowel, Dobet, and Dobest
(New Haven, 1957; Yale Stud, in English, 136); John Lawler, Piers Plowman:
An Essay in Criticism (1962); Elizabeth Salter, Piers Plowman: An
Introduction (Cambridge, Mass., 1962); Morton W.Bloomfield, Piers
Plowman as a Fourteenth-Century Apocalypse (New Brunswick, N.J., 1962)
and for a briefer statement an article with the same title in the Centennial
Review of Arts and Sciences (Michigan State Univ.), v (1961). 281295;
Nevill Coghill, Gods Wenches and the Light That Spoke (Some notes on
Langlands kind of poetry), English and Medieval Studies Presented to
J.R.R.Tolkien (1962), pp. 200217; Hans Bruneder, Personifikation und
Symbol in William Langlands Piers Plowman (Vienna, 1963); P.M.Kean,
Love, Law, and Lewte in Piers Plowman, RES, n.s. XV (1964). 241261;
Marshall Walker, Piers Plowmans Pardon: A Note, English Studies in
Africa, VIII (1965). 6470. Because of an important allusion in the poem,
mention may be made of The Sermons of Thomas Brinton, Bishop of
Rochester(13731389) , ed. Sister M.Aquinas Devlin (2v, 1954; Camden
Soc., Third Ser., LXXXVLXXXVI), and William J.Brandt, Remarks on
Bishop Thomas Brintons Authorship of the Sermons in MS. Harley 3760,
MS, XXI (1959). 291296, the last a reply to a review in Speculum, XXX
(1955). 267271. Brinton, of course, is also known as Brunton.
248 Arthur B.Ferguson, The Problem of Counsel in Mum and the
Sothsegger, SRen, II (1955). 6783.
XVI. Chaucer: I
249 The standard edition of Chaucers works by F.N.Robinson appeared in
a revised edition in 1957. Chaucers Major Poetry, ed. Albert C.Baugh (1963)
also offers a critical text of nearly all the poetry with extensive annotation.
Dudley D.Griffiths Bibliography of Chaucer 19081953, (Seattle, 1955)
336
supersedes his compilation of 1928. Albert C.Baughs Fifty Years of Chaucer

Scholarship, Speculum, XXVI (1951). 659672, may permit more recent
work to be seen in perspective.
A number of overall treatments of the poet are to be noted, although they
vary in character and value: Nevill Coghill, The Poet Chaucer (1949);
J.S.P.Tatlock, The Mind and Art of Chaucer (Syracuse, 1950); Kemp Malone,
Chapters on Chaucer (Baltimore, 1951); Gordon H.Gerould, Chaucerian
Essays (Princeton, 1952); G.K.Chesterton, Chaucer (1956); Mary Giffin,
Studies on Chaucer and His Audience (Quebec, 1956); Paull F.Baum,
Chaucer: A Critical Appreciation (Durham, N.C., 1957); D.S.Brewer,
Chaucer (2ed, 1960) and Chaucer in His Time (1963); Bertrand H.Bronson,
In Search of Chaucer (Toronto, 1960); Marchette Chute, Geoffrey Chaucer
of England (2ed, 1962); Edwin J.Howard, Geoffrey Chaucer (1964).
Collections of reprinted articles and essays have been edited by Edward
Wagenknecht (1959) and by Richard J.Schoeck and Jerome Taylor (2v, Notre
Dame, 19601), both collections in inexpensive paperback form.
As this is being written a new edition of the Chaucer Life Records, ed.
M.M. Crow and C.C.Olson, is announced as about to appear by the Oxford
University Press. P.Godeile, Chaucer en Espagne?, Recueil de Travaux
offert M.Clovis Brunel (2V, Paris, 1955), II. 913, calls attention to a
document long in print but-previously overlooked, indicating that Chaucer
was in Spain in February, 1366, on an official mission. P.R.Watts, The
Strange Case of Geoffrey Chaucer and Cecilia Chaumpaigne, Law Quar.
Rev., LXIII (1947). 491515, views the episode as a modern lawyer sees it,
but cf. T.F.T.Plucknet, ibid., LXIV, 3336. Valuable background on life in
Chaucers day is provided in Edith Rickert, Chaucers World, ed. C.C.Olson
and M.M.Crow (1948), and, mainly in pictures, Roger S.Loomis, A Mirror
of Chaucers World (Princeton, 1965). There is a revised edition of Waiter
C.Curry, Chaucer and the Medieval Sciences (1960). An important article
casting doubt on Chaucers acquaintance at first hand with rhetorical
treatises, as claimed by Manly in a widely accepted article, is James J.Murphy,
A New Look at Chaucer and the Rhetoricians, RES, n.s. xv (1964). 120,
in connection with which may be noted the same authors The Arts of
Discourse, 10501400, MS, XXIII (1961). 194205, and The Medieval
Arts of Discourse: An Introductory Bibliography, Speech Monographs,
XXIX (1962). 7178.
The interpretation of medieval poetry by methods familiar in early
scriptural exegesis, with its emphasis on allegory and symbolism, is a subject
on which scholars strongly disagree. Its current vogue and attendant reaction
spring from two books: D.W.Robertson, Jr., A Preface to Chaucer: Studies
in Medieval Perspective (Princeton, 1963) and D.W.Robertson, Jr. and
Bernard F.Hupp, Piers Plowman and Scriptural Tradition, mentioned under
the preceding chapter, together with earlier articles by the same authors.
Among discussions of the method may be mentioned Patristic Exegesis in
the Criticism of Medieval Literature, English Inst. Selected Papers, 1958
1959 (1960), a symposium participated in by E.T.Donaldson (The
Opposition), R.E.Kaske (The Defense), and Charles Donahue (Summation);
Morton W.Bloomfield, Symbolism in Medieval Literature, MP, LVI (1958).
7381; and R.E.Kaske, Chaucer and Medieval Allegory, ELH, XXX
CHAUCER: II
337
(1963). 175192, Francis L.Utley, Robertsonianism Redivivus, Romance

Phil., XIX (1965). 250260, the last two review articles on Robertsons
book.
251 On Thomas Chaucers daughter, presumably the poets granddaughter,
see Marjorie Anderson, Alice Chaucer and her Husbands, PMLA, LX
(1945). 2447. On Chaucers French affiliations see Charles Muscatine,
Chaucer and the French Tradition: A Study in Style and Meaning (Berkeley,
1957) and Haldeen Braddy, Chaucer and the French Poet Graunson (Baton
Rouge, 1947). A new text of the Roman de la Rose is being published by
Felix Lecoy (vol. I, Paris, 1965; CFMA, 92).
2526 On the influence of Dante and Boccaccio see Howard Schless,
Chaucer and Dante, English Inst. Selected Papers, 19581959 (1960),
pp. 134171, and Robert A.Pratt, Chaucers Use of the Teseida, PMLA,
XLII (1947). 598621. On the period of Chaucers work discussed in the
present chapter see Wolfgang Clemen, Chaucers Early Poetry, trans.
C.A.M.Sym (1964), a translation of Chaucer s frhe Dichtung (Gttingen,
1963), itself a reworking of the authors earlier Der junge Chaucer (1938);
Bernard F.Hupp and D.W.Robertson, Jr., Fruyt and Chaf: Studies in
Chaucers Allegories (Princeton, 1963), on The Book of the Duchess and
The Hous of Fame; Georgia R.Crampton, Transitions and Meaning in The
Book of the Duchess, JEGP, LXII (1963). 486500; The Parlement of
Foulys, ed. D.S.Brewer (1960); J.A.W.Bennett, The Parlement of Foules: An
Interpretation (Oxford, 1957); Charles O.McDonald, An Interpretation of
Chaucers Parlement of Foules, Speculum, xxx (1955). 444457; Sanford
B.Meech, Design in Chaucers Troilus (Syracuse, N.Y., 1959); Robert
A.Pratt, Chaucer and Le Roman de Troyle et de Criseida, SP, LIII (1956).
509539; John J.OConnor, The Astronomical Dating of Chaucers Troilus
JEGP, LV (1956). 556562. A second astronomical treatise which there is
good reason to believe is by Chaucer has been discovered: The Equatorie of
the Planetis, ed. from Peterhouse MS. 75. I, by Derek J.Price (Cambridge,
1955).
XVII. Chaucer: II
258 A.C.Cawley (ed.), Canterbury Tales (1958; Everymans Library, 307)
reprints Robinsons text. The following books and articles deserve mention:
Muriel Bowden, A Commentary on the General Prologue to the Canterbury
Tales (1948); Robert M.Lumiansky, Of Sundry Folk: The Dramatic
Principle in the Canterbury Tales (Austin, Texas, 1955); William
W.Lawrence, Chaucer and the Canterbury Tales (1950); T.W.Craik, The
Comic Tales of Chaucer (1964); Ralph Baldwin, The Unity of the
Canterbury Tales (Copenhagen, 1955; Anglistica, v); Harold F.Brooks,
Chaucers Pilgrims: The Artistic Order of the Portraits in the Prologue
(1962); C.Owen (ed.), Discussions of the Canterbury Tales (Boston, 1961);
Robert A.Pratt, The Order of the Canterbury Tales, PMLA, LXVI
(1951). 11411167; Donald C.Baker, The Bradshaw Order of The
Canterbury Tales: A Dissent, NeuphiL Mitt., LXIII (1962). 245261;
Bernard F.Hupp, A Reading of the Canterbury Tales (1964); Paul
G.Ruggiers, The Art of the Canterbury Tales (Madison, 1965). It is
338
impossible to list the many articles, critical and interpretive, of the

individual tales and their tellers; for these the reader is referred to the
annual bibliographies mentioned under chap. I. Because of the interest in
and importance of the Wife of Bath mention may be made of Robert
A.Pratt, The Development of the Wife of Bath, Studies in Medieval
Literature, ed. MacEdward Leach (Philadelphia, 1961), pp. 4579, and
Jankyns Book of Wikked Wyves: Medieval Matrimonial Propaganda in
the Universities, Annuale Mediaevale, III (1962). 527.
XVIII. Other Contemporaries of Chaucer

264 John H.Fisher, John Gower: Moral Philosopher and Friend of Chaucer
(1964) is the first full length treatment of the poet. The same author has
published A Calendar of Documents Relating to the Life of John Gower
the Poet, JEGP, LVIII (1959). 123. Other discussions include Gardiner
Stillwell, John Gower and the Last Years of Edward III, SP, XLV (1948).
454471; Dorothea Siegmund-Schultze, John Gower und seine Zeit, Zs.
fr Anglistik u. Amerikanistik, in (1955). 571; J.B.Dwyer, Gowers Mirour
and Its French Sources: A Reexamination of Evidence, SP, XLVIII (1951).
482505; Lewis Thorpe, A Source for the Confessio Amantis MLR, XLIII
(1948). 175181.
267 Josephine W.Bennett, The Rediscovery of Sir John Mandeville (1954;
MLA Monograph Ser., XIX) must be given precedence over the references in
note II. Mrs. Bennett vigorously attacks the testimony of Jean dOutremeuse,
produces many additional John Mandevilles in England, including the region
of St. Albans, and believes that some one of them was the probable author.
She argues (less convincingly) for 1356 as the date of composition. Malcolm
Letts, Sir John Mandeville: The Man and His Book (1949), retains more of
the older views. Letts has also edited the French text (2v, 1953; Hakluyt
Soc.). An abridged English version is edited by M.C.Seymour, The Bodley
Version of Mandeville s Travelswith Parallel Extracts from the Latin Text
(1963; EETS, 253) and has discussed The Origin of the Egerton Version of
Mandevilles Travels MA, XXX (1961). 159169. J.D.Thomas, The Date
of Mandevilles Travels MLN, LXXII (1957). 165169, dates the English
translation between 1367 and 1370.
268 David C.Fowler throws New Light on John of Trevisa, Traditio,
XVIII (1962). 289317. Two items on Usk deserve mention: Claes Schaar,
Notes on Thomas Usks Testament of Love (Lund, 1950; Acta Univ.
Lundensis, N.F. avd. I, Bd. 46, pp. 146) and S.K.Heninger, Jr., The
Margarite-Pearl Allegory in Thomas Usks Testament of Love Speculum,
XXXII (1957). 9298.
270 There have been important developments in Wyclif studies, especially
the Wyclifite Bible, To be noted are Joseph H.Dahmus, The Prosecution of
John Wyclyf (New Haven, 1952); Kenneth B.McFarlane, John Wycliffe and
the Beginnings of English Nonconformity (1952); Edward A.Block, John
Wyclif, Radical Dissenter (San Diego, Calif., 1962; San Diego State Coll.,
Humanities Monograph Ser., Vol. I, No. I) ; J.A.Robson, Wyclif and the
Oxford Schools: The Relation of the Summa de Ente to Scholastic Debates
at Oxford in the Later Fourteenth Century (Cambridge, 1961; Cambridge
339
Stud, in Medieval Life and Thought, n.s. VIII); Margaret W.Ransom, The
Chronology of Wyclifs English Sermons, Research Stud, of the State College
of Washington, XVI (1948). 67114. The most important contribution to
our knowledge of the Wyclif Bible since the present chapter was written is
Sven L.Fristedt, The Wycliffe Bible, Part I: The Principal Problems connected
with Forshall and Maddens Edition (Stockholm, 1953; Stockholm Stud, in
English, IV). Whether we accept his views as to Wyclifs more direct
participation in the work of translation and revision, Fristedts book must
be the starting point for any future work in both text and authorship. See
also the same authors The Authorship of the Lollard Bible: Summary and
Amplification of the Wyclyffe Bible, Part I, Studier i Modern Sprkvetenskap
(Uppsala), XIX (1956). 2841, a necessary supplement to his book. Bodl.
MS. 959, though not the original copy of the translator, as Forshall and
Madden thought, is (the part from Genesis to Baruch 3:20) still the earliest
and most important MS of the Early Version. This is being edited by Conrad
Lindberg (3V, Stockholm, 195963; the last two volumes are in Stockholm
Stud, in English, VIII, X). See also Sven L.Fristedt, The Dating of the Earliest
Manuscript of the Wycliffite Bible, Studier i Modern Sprkvetenskap, n.s.
I (19569). 7985. Mention may also be made of Henry Hargraves, An
Intermediate Version of the Wycliffite Old Testament, Studio, Neophil,
XXVIII (1956). 130147, and David C.Fowler, John Trevisa and the English
Bible, MP, LVIII (1960). 8198, which claims a part for Trevisa in the
work of translation.
XIX. The Beginnings of the Drama

273 Carl J.Stratman, Bibliography of Medieval Drama (Berkeley, 1954) is a
convenient tool. Hardin Craig, English Religious Drama of the Middle Ages
(Oxford, 1955) is a valuable contribution. Arnold Williams, The Drama of
Medieval England (East Lansing, 1961) is a briefer treatment.
O.B.Hardison, Jr., Christian Rite and Christian Drama in the Middle Ages:
Essays in the Origin and Early History of Modern Drama (Baltimore,
1965), questions some of the traditional views. Useful for comparison with
English developments is Grace Frank, The Medieval French Drama
(Oxford, 1954).
276 Le Mystre dAdam (Ordo representacionis Ade) has been edited by
Paul Aebischer (Geneva, 1963).
277 The first volume of Glynne Wickham, Early English Stages, 1300 to
1660 (1959) treats the period here discussed. On the English cycles in
general see Eleanor Prosser, Drama and Religion in the English Mystery
Plays: A Re-evaluation (Stanford, 1961; Stanford Stud, in Lang. and Lit.,
XXIII) and Jerome Taylor, The Dramatic Structure of the Middle English
Corpus Christi, or Cycle Plays, in Literature and Society, ed. Bernice Slate
(Lincoln, Neb., 1964), pp. 175186.
279 A modernized version of the York Plays has been prepared by John
S. Purvis (1957). See also J.W.Robinson, The Art of the York Realist, MP,
LX (1963). 241251.
280 The translation of The Wake field Mystery Plays by Martial Rose
(1961) has a useful introduction. Other discussions of the Towneley cycle
340
include: Arnold Williams, The Characterization of Pilate in the Towneley

Plays (East Lansing, 1950); Martin Stevens, The Composition of the
Towneley Talents Play: A Linguistic Examination, JEGP, LVIII (1959).
423433; A.C.Cawley (ed.), The Wakefield Pageants in the Towneley Cycle
(Manchester, 1958); John E.Bernbrock, Notes on the Towneley Cycle
Slaying of Abel, JEGP, LXII (1963). 317322; Howard H.Schless, The
Comic Element in the Wakefield Noah, Studies in Medieval Literature, ed.
MacEdward Leach (Philadelphia, 1961), pp. 229243; Francis
J.Thompson, Unity in The Second Shepherds Play, MLN, LXIV (1949).
302306.
281 F.M.Salter, Mediaeval Drama in Chester (Toronto, 1955).
283 Arnold Williams, The English Moral Play before 1500, Annuale
Mediaevale, IV (1963). 522.
285 Jacob Bennett, The Castle of Perseverance: Redactions, Place, and
Date, MS, XXIV (1962). 141152; Richard Southern, The Medieval
Theatre in the Round: A Study of the Staging of The Castle of Perseverance
and Related Matters (1957) ; John J.Molloy, A Theological Interpretation of
the Moral Play, Wisdom, Who Is Christ (Washington, D.C., 1952); Sister
Mary P.Coogan, An Interpretation of the Moral Play Mankind
(Washington, D.C., 1947); Donald C.Baker, The Date of Mankind, PQ,
XLII (1963). 9091, suggests 146469 on numismatic evidence.
286 Everyman has been edited by A.C.Cawley (Manchester, 1961). See
also Henry de Vocht, Everyman: A Comparative Study of Texts and Sources
(Louvain, 1947; Materials for the Study of the Old English Drama, n.s.
XX); J.Van Mierlo, De prioriteit van Elckerlyck tegenover Everyman
gebandhaafd (Antwerp, 1948; Kon. VI. Acad. voor Taal en Letterkunde,
Reeks III, Nr. 27); R.W. Zandvoort, EverymanElckerlijc, tudes
Anglaises, XI (1953). 115; Lawrence V.Ryan, Doctrine and Dramatic
Structure in Everyman Speculum, XXXII (1957). 722735.
XX. Ebb Tide

288 H.S.Bennetts Chaucer and the Fifteenth Century has been mentioned
under Chap. I.
289 Elizabeth Zeeman, Nicholas Lovea Fifteenth-Century Translator,
RES, n.s. VI (1955) is a good treatment.
293 Ethel Seaton, Sir Richard Roos, c. 14101482, Lancastrian Poet
(1961) identifies the poet (not the Richard Ros previously accepted), traces
his family and his own career in detail, and claims on highly questionable
grounds his authorship of a large corpus of English verse. There is an
edition of The Floure and the Leafe and The Assembly of Ladies by
D.A.Pearsall (1962). See also this editors The Assembly of Ladies and
Generydes RES, n.s. XII (1961). 229237. The Scottish Chaucerians are
discussed in A.M.Kinghorn, The Mediaeval Makars, Texas Stud, in Lit.
and Lang., I (1959). 7388, Kurt Wittig, The Scottish Tradition in
Literature (Edinburgh, 1958), and James Kinsley (ed.), Scottish Poetry: A
Critical Survey (1955), pp. 132 (by the editor).
294 There has been considerable interest in Henryson: Marshall
W.Stearns, Robert Henryson (1949); Charles Elliott (ed.), Robert
LOOKING FORWARD
341
Henryson: Poems Selected (Oxford, 1963; Clarendon Medieval and

Tudor Ser.); Mary Rowlands, The Fables of Robert Henryson, Dalhousie
Rev., XXXIX (1960). 491502; Denton Fox, Henrysons Fables ELH,
XXIX (1962). 337356; David K.Crowne, A Date for the Composition of
Henrysons Fables JEGP, LXI (1962). 583590, suggesting a date not long
after 1485 or 1486; Richard Bauman, The Folktale and Oral Tradition in
the Fables of Robert Henryson, Fabula, VI (1963). 108124. On The
Testament of Cresseid see excellent essay by E.M.W.Tillyard in Five Poems,
14701870 (1948); A.C.Spearing, The Testament of Cresseid and the
High Concise Style, Speculum, XXXVII (1962). 208225; Douglas
Duncan, Henrysons Testament of Cresseid EIC, XI (1961). 128135;
Sydney Harth, Henryson Reinterpreted, ibid., 471480 (a reply to the
preceding item); Charles Elliott, Two Notes on Henrysons Testament of
Cresseid, JEGP, LIV (1955). 241254. Charles dOrlans authorship of
the English renderings of his poems has been denied. See Daniel Poirion,
Cration potique et composition romanesque dans les premiers pomes
de Charles dOrlans, Revue des sciences humaines, n.s. fasc. 90 (1958).
185211, and Sergio Cigada, LOpera poetica di Charles dOrlans (Milan,
1960). But see the vigorous rebuttal of John Fox, Charles dOrlans, pote
anglais, Romania, LXXXVI (1965). 433462. See also Harold Watson,
Charles dOrlans: 13941465, RR, LVI (1965). 311.
295 W.F.Schirmer, John Lydgate: A Study in the Culture of the XVth
Century (1961) is a translation by Ann E.Keep of the German original
(Tbingen, 1952). Alain Renoir, John Lydgate, Poet of the Transition,
English Miscellany, XI (1960). 919, is a suggestive article, and see his John
Lydgate, Poet of Transition (Cambridge, Mass., 1966).
296 See Alain Renoir, The Immediate Source of Lydgates Siege of
Thebes, Studia NeophiL, XXXIII (1961). 8695 and James M.Clark,
The Dance of Death in Medieval Literature: Some Recent Theories of Its
Origin, MLR, XLV (1950). 336345. The Pynson edition (1511) of The
Gouernaunce of Kynges and Prynces is edited in facsimile by D.T.Starnes
(Gainesville, Fla., 1957; SF&R).
297 There is an essay on Hoccleve in H.S.Bennett, Six Medieval Men and
Women (Cambridge, 1955). The same author notes in Thomas Hoccleves
Death, LTLS, Dec. 25, 1953, p. 833, that Hoccleves corrody in the priory
of South wick was given to another on Aug. 18, 1437, which would
normally imply his death, but so early a date would leave unexplained the
Balade to my gracious Lord of York which has generally been dated c.
1448. See also H.C.Schulz, Thomas Hoccleve, Scribe, Speculum, XII
(1937). 7181, which should have been mentioned in the original edition of
this book, and Beverly Boyd, Hoccleves Miracle of the Virgin, Univ. of
Texas Stud, in English, XXXV (1956). 116122.
298 A.I.Doyle, More Light on John Shirley, MA, XXX (1961). 93
101, offers new biographical matter including Shirleys will.
XXI. Looking Forward

300 Robert W.Ackerman, Henry Lovelichs Merlin, PMLA, LXVII
(1952). 473484.
342
302 J.A.Mulders (ed.), The Cordyal by Anthony Woodville, Earl Rivers

(Nijmegen, 1962). K.B.McFarlane, William Worcester: A Preliminary
Survey, Studies Presented to Sir Hilary Jen kinson (1957), pp. 196221;
Thomas D.Kendrick , John Rous and William of Worcester, in his British
Antiquity (1950), pp. 1833.
303 Paston Letters, selected and ed. by Norman Davis (Oxford, 1958);
Norman Davis, The Language of the Pastons (1955; Sir Israel Gollancz
Memorial Lecture). There is a new edition (1957) of the book by R.Weiss
mentioned in note 33.
304 Everett H.Emerson, Reginald Pecock: Christian Rationalist,
Speculum, XXXI (1956). 235242.
305 The discovery and publication of the Winchester MS has greatly
stimulated the study of Malory. The text of Vinavers edition without the
commentary is available in one volume (Oxford, 1954). Essays by several
hands make up two collective volumes: Essays on Malory, ed.
J.A.W.Bennett (Oxford, 1963), and Malorys Originality: A Critical Study
of Le Morte Darthur, ed. (and partly written by) Robert M.Lumiansky
(Baltimore, 1964). One essay in the former volume and all in the latter
oppose Vinavers contention that the Morte Darthur is really eight separate
tales rather than a unified work. The controversy has also been carried on
in articles in the learned journals. For these the student must be referred to
the annual bibliographies mentioned in this Supplement under p. 109. Of
general interest is Arthur B.Ferguson, The Indian Summer of English
Chivarly: Studies in the Decline and Transformation of Chivalric Idealism
(Durham, N.C., 1960).
308 Two excellent collections of ballads are now available in Evelyn
K.Wells, The Ballad Tree: British and American Ballads, Their Folklore,
Verse, and Music, together with Sixty Traditional Ballads and Their Tunes
(1950) and MacEdward Leach, The Ballad Book (1951). Of first
importance is Bertrand H. Bronson, The Traditional Tunes of the Child
Ballads, with their Texts (3V, Princeton, 195965, in prog.). Two other
books should be mentioned: Tristram P.Coffin, The British Traditional
Ballad in North America (Philadelphia, 1951; Pub. Amer. Folklore Soc.,
Bibl. Ser., II) and MacEdward Leach and Tristram P. Coffin (eds.), The
Critics and the Ballad (Carbondale, Ill., 1961), selected essays.
Index
[Boldface numbers indicate main reference in the text. Numbers preceded by an S in
this Index refer to paragraph/page numbers set in boldface in the BIBLIOGRAPHICAL
SUPPLEMENT. These paragraph numbers correspond to pages of the text.]
Abelard 144
Abercrombie, Lascelles 89
Abingdon 35
Abraham and Isaac 279
Acta Pilati 162
Active Policy of a Prince, The 298
Adam (Anglo-Norman) 140, 276 S276
Adam Bell, Clim of the Clough, and William
of Cloudesly 310
Adelaide de Cond 136
Adelaide of Louvain 135
Adelard of Bath 136, 150
Admonition 83 S83
Advent, The 79 S79
cerbot 41
gelmund 54
lfric 18, 101, 105, 117, 118 S18, 101
lfwine 54
neas 184, 253
neid 63, 93
sop 97, 295
thelbirht, King, Laws of 35
thelwold 17, 18, 100
thelwold, life of (lfric) 18
thelwold, life of (Wulfstan) 18
thelwulf 16
Ailred of Rievaulx 150, 153 S150
Alain 140
Alberic of Pisanon 181
Alboin 54
Alceste, Queen 256
Alcuin 16, 17, 53, 154
Aldhelm 13, 89, 92 S13
Alexander (prose) 300
Alexander A 182, 232
Alexander B 182, 232
Alexander C 183
Alexanders Letter to Aristotle 104
Alexander the Great 141, 181 S181
Alfred, King 45, 86, 92, 96100, 105, 117,
152, 255 S97
Alfred Jewel 86
Alfred of Beverly 170
All that I may swink or swete 222
Alliterative revival 184, 23248
Alliterative verse 2328
Alma Redemptoris Mater 223
Alphabet of Tales 207
Alysoun 212
Ambrosius Aurelianus 168
Amis and Amiloun 141, 193
Amoryus and Cleopes 302
Ancrene Riwle 125, 126, 12734, 228, 304
S12733
Andreas 29, 75 S75
Andrew of Wyntoun 266
Anelida and Arctic 254
Angel to the vergyn said, The 216
Angles 3
Anglo-Latin writings 1219, 14351 S14450
Anglo-Norman literature 13542 S123, S135
42
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. See Old English
Annals.
Annales Cambriae 168
Annals (Old English). See Old English Annals.
Annals of Winchester 153
Anne of Bohemia 254
Annunciation 216
Anselm, life of (Eadmer) 18
Anselm of Laon 159
Apollonius (Old English) 104, 300 S104
Apology for Lollard Doctrines 289
Arabian Nights, The 103
Archipoeta 149
Aristotle 150, 296
Arthur, King 165, 167, 169, 189, 193 S167
Arthur 189 S189
Arthur and Merlin 190 S189
Arthurian legend 16572, 18993 S165, 189
Artorius 167
Arundel, Countess of 140
As I lay upon a night 217
As You Like It 194
Ascension, The 71
Ase y me rod this ender day 216
Ashby, George 298
Assembly of Gods, The 290
Assembly of Ladies, The 293 S293
Asser, bishop 16, 97, 98
Astrolabe 255
Athelstan, King 56
Athelstan, legends of 118
Athelston 180
Attila 54
Aube 210
343
344
INDEX
Aucassin et Nicolete 193

Auchinleck MS 240
Audelay, John 216
Audoin 54
Augustine, St. 97, 101
Augustine, St. (of Hippo) 12
Aureate terms 291
Awntyrs of Arthur, The 190
Awyntyre off Gawane 239
Ayenbite of Inwit 204
Aymeri de Narbonne 185
Azariah 66
Babees Book 303
Babylon 309
Babyngton, Anthony 302
Bacon, Roger 150 S150
Badon, Mount 168
Balds Leech Book S104
Balade to my gracious Lord of York. S297
Ballad 199, 30812 S308
Ballad of a Nun, The 197
Ballette 210
Barbara Allen 309
Barbour, John 184, 266, 300
Barlaam and Josaphat 139
Barnes, Dame Julians 303
Bartholomeus Anglicus, 150, 268
Battle of Otterburn, The 310
Bayeux Tapestry 98
Beast fable 262
Beauchamp, Richard, Earl of Warwick 305
Beaufort, Joan 293
Bede 3, 1516, 44, 81, 92, 96, 98, 101, 102,
169, 171 S1516, 20, 60
Bedes History (Old English version) 978
Bedevere 168
Bel Inconnu Le 190
Belle Dame sans Mercy, La 292
Benedeit 136
Benedict Biscop 14
Benedict of Peterborough 148
Benedictine Office 85, S85, 103
Beneeit, Maistre 138
Benjamin Major 226
Benjamin Minor 226
Benot de Ste.-More 138, 183, 255
Beowulf 249, 43, 46, 504, 76, 924, 155
S23, 41, 43, 50, 68, 75, 923
Berkeley, Elizabeth 302
Berkeley, Lord Thomas 301
Berners, Dame Juliana. See Barnes.
Berners, Lord. See Bourchier.
Bertran de Bar-sur-Aube 185
Bessie Bell and Mary Gray 310
Bestiaire 136 S136
Bestiary 161 S136.
See also Physiologus.
Bestiary (Philippe de Than) 136
Bethlem 40
Bevis of Hampton 173, 179, 189, 262
Bible (Wyclif) 271 S270

Bible, Authorized Version 272
Bible, translation of 268
Biblia cum Glossis 159
Black Prince 257
Blackfriars Synod 270
Blanchardyn and Eglantine 301
Blickling Homilies 103 S96, 103
Blind Harry 291
Blostman 97 S97
Blow, northerne wynd 212
Boccaccio, Giovanni 198, 236, 250, 255, 258,
296 S2526
Bodel, Jean 174, 193
Bodley Homilies 118
Body and Soul. See Disputisoun between.
Body and Soul theme 119
Body and the Worms 164
Boethius 97, 99, 255, 290, 302
Boethius (Alfred) 979, 117
Boeve de Haumtone 142
Boke of Noblesse 302
Boke of Nurture 303
Bokenham, Osbern 289, 302
Bon Florence of Rome, Le 194
Boniface, St. 17, 19, 43
Bonnie James Campbell 309
Book of Cupid, The. See Cuckoo and the
Nightingale.
Book, of the Duchess 2523, 263, 295 S2526
Book, of Feith, The 304
Book, of the Glory and Perfection of the
Saints. See Melum Contemplativorum.
Book, of the Knight of La Tour Landry 236,
303
Book, of Margery Kempe 231 S230
Book, of St. Albans 303
Book, of Sindibad 194
Book, of Vices and Virtues, The 204
Bourchier, Henry 302
Bourchier, John (Lord Berners) 301
Bourchier, Lady Isabel 302
Bozon, Nicole 140 S140
Breton, Nicholas 130
Breton lay 1957, 262 S195
Bricrius Feast 236
Brigham, Nicholas 247
Brinton, Thos. S247
Bromyard, John 150, 206 S150
Bruce, Robert 266
Bruce, The 266
Brunanburg 569
Brunton, Thomas. See Brinton.
Brussels cross 86
Brut (Layamon) 152, 157, 170, 189 S170
Buke of the Howlat, The 291
Bunyan, John 289
Buonaccorso 303
Burgh, Benedict 296, 302
But, John 245
INDEX
Bycorne and Chychevache 297
Byrhtferth 104
Byrhtnoth 57
Byrhtwold 47
Caedmon, 22, 601 69, 74, 79, 208 S20, 60
Caedmons Hymn 60
Caister, Richard 218
Call to Prayer. See Macaronic Poem.
Callisthenes. See Pseudo-Callisthenes.
Canso 211
Canterbury Tales 198, 205, 254, 257, 25863
S258
Canterbury Tales, continuations of 292
Cantilenae 118
Capella Martianus 290
Capgrave, John 304
Captain Car 310
Carl of Carlisle 236
Carlyle, Thomas 148
Carmen de Abbatibus CellaeSuae (thelwulf)
16
Carmina Ecclesiastica (Aldhelm) 14
Carmina Rhythmica (thilwald) 13
Carol 221 S221
Carolingian Renaissance 17
Castle of Perseverance, The 285 S285
Catechism (Gaytryge) 207
Catholic Homilies. See Homiline Catholicae.
Caudre, Thomas 264
Caxton 184, 301, 306, 3078
Ceolfrid, abbot 15
Ceys and Alcione 252
Champions Bargain, The 236
Chanson courtoise 211
Chanson damour 211
Chanson daventure 213
Chanson de geste 185
Chanson dhistoire 210
Chanson de mal marie 210
Chanson de Roland 185
Chanson de toile 210
Chanson des Saisnes 174
Chante-fable 193
Character, the, 130
Chardry 139
Charlemagne 170, 185
Charlemagne and Roland 187
Charlemagne Romances 1859
Charles the Great 17
Charles the Great 301
Charles VI 254
Charles dOrleans 294, 303 S294
Charms. See Spells.
Chartier, Alain 292
Chateau dAmour, Le 139 201, 206
Chaucer, Alice 303 S251
Chaucer, Geoffrey 195, 198, 210, 213, 222,
24963, 291 S24958
Chaucer, John 249
345
Chaucer, Lewis 251

Chaucer, Philippa 250
Chaucer, Thomas 251, 296 S251
Chaucerians 2914 S293
Chester Plays 206, 2812 S281
Chevelere Assigne 194
Child Maurice 3089
Chrtien de Troyes 165, 167, 174, 189, 192,
236
Christ. See next three entries.
Christ A. See Advent, The.
Christ B. See Ascension, The.
Christ C. See Doomsday Poems.
Christ and Satan 68
Christina 133
Christine de Pisan 302
Chronica (Ethelwerd) 18
Chronica (Roger Hoveden) 148
Chronica Majora 148
Chronicle (Fantosme) 138 S139
Chronicle (Hardyng) 305
Chronicle (Langtoft) 139, 204
Chronicle of England (Capgrave) 304
Chronicle of Mont St. Michel 168
Chronicon ex Chronicis 147
Church and Her Members, The 271
Churl and the Bird, The 295, 297
Cicero 303
Clanvowe, Sir John 293
Cleanness. See Purity.
Clemence of Barking S137
Clerk Colvin 310
Clerks Tale 262
Clifford, Lewis 293
Cligs 165
Cloud of Unknowing 226, 229, 231 S229
Cnuts Song 119, 208
Colloquy (lfric) 18, 101
Colman 18
Colonna, Egidio 298
Commandment of the Love of God 228
Compend of Alchemy 290
Compendium Philosophiae (Roger Bacon) 150
Complaint (Hoccleve) 298
Complaint of God to Sinful Man 304
Complaint of the Black Knight 295
Complaint to his Empty Purse 251
Complaint to His Lady 254
Complaint unto Pity 254
Comput 136
Conception Nostre Dame, La (Wace) 138
Confessio Amantis 2646
Conflictus Corporis et Animae 163
Conflictus Veris et Hiemis 154
Conquest of Ireland 139, 146
Consolation of Philosophy 255
Consolation of Philosophy (Walton trans.) 302
Constantine 168
346
Constitutions of Lambeth 202
Conte de la Charette, Le. See Lancelot.
Conte du Graal, Le. See Perceval.
Contes Moraliss 140
Contra Judaeos 276
Cooks Tale 260
Coomb abbey 305
Cordyal, The S302
Corpus Christi Carol S221
Corpus Christi day 277
Corset 140
Cotton Gnomics 43
Cotton Prayer 86
Court of Sapience 290
Courtenay, Bishop 270
Courtesy literature 303
Coventry plays 282
Creatura 89
Creed (Old English) 86
Creed Play 2834
Crispin, Gilbert 113
Croxton play. See Play of the Sacrament.
Crusade, Third 179
Cuckoo and the Nightingale, The 293
Cuckoo Song 214
Curse of Urse 119
Cursor Mundi 164, 2067 S206
Custance la gentil 136
Cuthbert 35
Cuthbert, St., life by Bede 16
Cymbeline 169
Cynewulf 22, 35, 7075, 80 S70, 745
Cynewulf, Cyneheard, Osric, story of 100
Cynric, King 323
Dame Sirith 198
Dan John Gaytryges Sermon 203
Dan Michel. See Michel.
Dance of Macabre 295, 297 S296
Danelaw 5
Daniel 65
Daniel A 66
Daniel B 66
Daniel of Morley. See Morley, Daniel.
Danish influence on English language 7
Dante 250, 253 S2526
Dares Phrygius 183, 255
David, Anglo-Norman poet 1367
Davidson, John 197
De Amicitia 303
De Ave Phoenice 76
De Bello Trojano 149
De Casibus Virorum Illustrium 296
De Civili Dominio 269
De Concordia Praescientiae et
Praedestinationis 268
De Consuetudine Monachorum 18
De Die Judicii 81
De Dominio Divino 269
De Ecclesia 270
INDEX
De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae 168
De Excidio Thoringiae 88
De Excidio Trojae Historic 183
De Gemmis 137
De Gestis Herewardi 209
De Gratia Contemplationis 226
De Honestate 303
De Jure et Statu Meneuensis Ecclesiae 147
De Laudibus Legum Angliae 305
De Legibus et Conseutudinibus Regni Angliae
150
De Ludo Scachorum 298
De Metrica Arte (Bede) 15
De Naturis Inferiorum et Superiorum 150
De Naturis Rerum (Neckham) 150
De Nugis Curialium 113, 118, 143, 146
De Officio Regis 270
De Ordine Christiano 270
De Papa 271
De Pontificibus et Sanctis Ecclesiae
Eboracensis Carmen (Alcuin) 16
De Potestate Papae 270
De Proprietatibus Rerum 150, 268
De Quincey, Thomas 115
De Ratione Temporum (Bede) 15
De Re Militari 268, 301
De Rebus a se Gestis 147
De Regimine Principum 268, 298
De Rosae Liliique Certamine 154
De Triplici Via 226
De Veritate Sacrae Scripturae 270
De Virginitate (Aldhelm) 14
Death 122
Death and Life 248
Death Song (Bede) 15, 44
Debate 154
Debate between the Body and the Soul. See
Disputisoun
Decameron, The 198, 259
Defensio Curatorum 268
Deguilleville, Guillaume 288, 289, 295, 296
Denis Piramus 137
Deonise Hid Divinite S229
Deor 26, 48, 208
Deorman 133
Des Cas des Nobles Hommes et Femmes 296
Descensus Christi ad Inferos 162
Deschamps, Eustache 210, 252, 257, 294
Descort 211
Description of Wales 146 S146
Destruction de Rome 186
Destruction of Jerusalem 232
Destruction of Troy, The 232
Dialects of Old English 7
Dialogue with a Friend 298
Dialogues (Gregory) 16, 97, 98
Dialogus de Scaccario 148
Dialogus inter Militem et Clericum 268
Dicts and Sayings of the Philosophers 302
Dictys Cretensis 183, 255
INDEX
Dido 91, 184, 253
Dietary, A 297
Digby plays 279
Disputisoun between the Body and the Soul
122, 154, 162 S162
Distichs of Cato 104, 117, 137, 302
Dives and Pauper 289
Divine Comedy 247, 252
Donatus 304
Donet 304
Doomsday 122
Doomsday (Wakefield) 281
Doomsday Poems 80 S81
Doon de Mayence 185
Douglas, Sir James 266
Douglas (Home) 309
Drama 27387 S273, 277
Dream of the Rood 21, 78, 91 S78
Dright 47
Drinking song 222
Drop 24
Dryden, John 293
Duke Rowland and Sir Otuell of Spayne 188
Dunstan 17, 100
Dunstan, life of (B) 18
Dunstan, life of (Eadmer) 18
Dunstan, life of (Osbern) 18
Durham Poem 88 S88
Eadmer 18 S18
Eadwacer 22, 90, 91, 208 S88
Eadwine 54
Ealdfrith, king of Northumbria 14
Ealhhild, Queen 46
Earl of Toulouse, The 196, 197
Earlier Genesis. See Genesis A.
Earth upon Earth 219
Easter sepulchre 274
Eastgota, King 53
Ecclesiastical History (Bede) 171
Eckhard, Meister 226
Eddi 16
Edgar, King 17, 100
Edgar, legends of 118
Edmund 56
Edmund Martyr. See St. Edmund.
Edward 309
Edward III 250
Edward IV 291
Edward, Prince of Wales (145371) 298
Edward the Confessor, Laws of 43
Edward the Confessor, life of (anon.) 18 S18
Egbert, King 4
Egbert, Archbishop of York 16, 104
Eger and Grime 193 S193
Ego Dormio 228
Eight Vices 118
Eight Virtues 119
Elckerlijc 286 S286
Eleanor of Aquitaine 136, 170, 183 S136
347
Elene 73
Elevatio Crucis 274
Elizabeth, Queen 255
Elsa 54
Elucidarium 140
Emare 196
Emendatio Vitae 228 S228
Emerca 53
Emerson, Ralph Waldo 105
Emma 133
Emma, Queen 119, 180
Eneydos 184, 301
English (the name) 6
Enigmata (Symphosius) 14
Ephemeris de Historia Belli Trojani 183
Epistle of Othea to Hector, The 302
Epistle of Privy Counsel 229
Epistola ad Acircium 14
Epistola Cuthberti de Obitu Bedae 44
Equatorie of the Planetis, The S2526
Eric et Enide 165, 173
Ermanric, King 53
Estampie 211
Estoire de Seint Aedward le Rei, La 137
Estoire del Saint Graal 306
Estoire des Engles (Gaimar) 97, 136, 138, 141
S138
Estoire du Graal 141
Ethelwerd 18 S18
Ethics (Aristotle) 150
Evangiles des Domnes, Les. See Miroir
(Robert of Gretham).
Everyman 2856 S286
Evidence to Beware and Good Counsel 298
Evil Times of Edward II, The 240 S240
Exemplum 262
Exeter Book 66
Exeter Gnomics 26, 43
Exeter Prayer 86
Exodus 645 S612
Fables (Henryson) 294 S294
Fabliau 1989, 262 S198
Fair Janet 310
Fair Margaret and Sweet William 310
Fall of Princes, The 2967
Falseness of Men 83 S83
Fantosme, Jordan 139 S139
Fasciculus Morum 207
Fastolf, Sir John 302
Fates of Men 83
Fates of the Apostles, The 35, 70
Fathers Teachings, A 83
Felix, monk of Croyland 16, 75
Ferumbras (Fillingham) 187, 188
Ferumbras group 186
Festial 205
Fierebras 186, 301
Fight at Finns Borough, The 49 S50
Fillingham MS 187
348
INDEX
Filostrato 255
Finn. See Fight at Finns Borough.
Fitela 54
FitzGilbert, Ralph 136, 138
Fitz-Neal, Richard 148
FitzRalph, Richard 268
Fitz Warin, Fulk 141 S141
Five Joys 216
Fled Bricrend 236
Flemming, Robert 303
Florence of Worcester 147
Floris and Blancheflour 175, 193
Floure of Curtesy 295
Flower and the Leaf, The 293 S293
Folower of the Donet 304
Fontaine de Toutes Sciences 290
Form of Living 228
Forraye of Gadderis, The 300
Fortescue, Sir John 305
Fouke Fitz Warin 141 S141
Four Daughters of God 140, 290
Four Degrees of Burning Love 226
Four Ps, The 286
Foure Sonnes of Aymon, The 301
Foweles in e frith 213
Franciscans 223
Franklins Tale 2612
Franks Casket 21 S21
Freawine 33
Free, John 303
French language in England 111
Friars 200
Fridla 53
Friedrich of Meissen 254
Frithegoda of Canterbury 18
Froissart, Jean 252, 253, 294, 301
Frollo 169
Futhark 20
Gaimar, Geoffrey 97, 136, 138, 141, 170 S138
Gamelin. See Tale of.
Ganymede and Helen 154
Garin de Monglane 185
Garmund 40
Garnier of Pont-Sainte-Maxence 137
Garter, Order of 237
Gawain 165, 1678, 190, 193
Gawain et Humbaut 236
Gawain Poet S233
Gay Goshawk, The 310
Gaytryge, John 203, 207
Gemma Ecclesiastica 209
Generides 194 S293
Genesis (Old English) 62, 93
Genesis A 624 S62
Genesis and Exodus 160, 164
Genesis B 49, 62, 69
Geoffrey de la Tour Landri 176
Geoffrey de Vinsauf 149
Geoffrey of Auxerre 133
Geoffrey of Monmouth 1134, 138, 147, 165

166, 16870, S169
Gerefa 36
Germania, 3, 32
Germanic languages 6, 8
Germanus 168
Gerusalemme Liberata 301
Gervase of Tilbury 146 S146
Gest Historiale of the Destruction of Troy 184,
300
Gest of Robyn Hode, A 311
Gest a Regis Henrici Secundi 148
Gesta Regum Anglorum 147, 168
Gesta Romanorum 150, 207, 298
Geste of Sir Gawain 190
Get Up and Bar the Door 311
Gewis 33
Gifica 54
Gifts of Men 72, 83 S83
Gilbert de la Pore 139
Gilbert of Sempringham 304
Gildas 168, 169
Gingelein 190
Giraldus Cambrensis 1467, 169, 209, 215
S146
Girart de Vienne 185
Gislhere 54
Gleeman 45
Gloria Patri (Old English) 86
Glossa Ordinaria 159
Glossary (lfric) 18, 101
Gnomic verse 43 S43
Goad of Love, The S229
God Is Myn Helpere 296
Godfrey of Boloyne (Caxton) 301
Godric, St. 120
Godwin, hermit of Kilburn 113
Golagrus and Gawain 190
Golden Legend (Caxton) 307
Goliardic poetry 143, 149 S149
Golias 149
Good Orison of Our Lady, A 122
Gorboduc 169
Gospel of Nicodemus 117, 119, 162, 268
Gottfried von Strassburg 174, 189
Gouernaunce of Kynges and Prynces S147
Gower, John 142, 264, 291 S264
Grace Dieu 288
Gradual 273
Grammar (lfric) 18, 101
Grave, The 82, 119
Green Knight, The 190
Gregory XI, Pope 269
Gregory of Tours 4
Greogry the Great 4, 72, 97, 101
Gregory the Great, life of 16 S16
Gret Gest off Arthure 239
Grey, William 303
Grosseteste, Robert 139, 150, 164, 201, 206,
215 S150
INDEX
Groundolf, Agnes 264
Gui de Warewic 142, 178
Guido della Colonna 183, 255, 296
Guillaume de Lorris 252
Guillaume de Perrault 202
Guillaume le Marechal. See Histoire de.
Guinevere 165, 169
Gunhilda 133
Gunhilda, Legends of 118
Gunthorpe, John 303
Guhere 54
Guthlac 75
Guthlac, St. 103
Guy of Amiens 135
Guy of Warwick 141, 193
Guy of Warwick 173, 178, 262
Hadrian, abbot 13
Hadrians Wall 88
Hagena 54
Hali Meidenhad 125, 134
Halsham, John 299
Hama 53
Handbook (Alfred) 97
Handbook (Byrhtferth) 104
Handlyng Synne 140, 164, 204, 207 S204
Hardyng, John 305
Harleian MS. 2253 213, 240 S213
Harrowing of Hell (Middle English) 162
Harrowing of Hell, The (Old English) 80
Havelok 138
Havelok, lai of 141
Havelok 175, 1767 S175
Hay, Sir Gilbert 300
Henden 54
Hengest 51, 168
Henry I 135
Henry II 136, 146, 156 S136
Henry V 298
Henry VI 296
Henry, Earl of Derby (Henry IV) 251, 264
Henry of Avranches 137, 149
Henry of Huntington 118
Henry of Lancaster S140
Henry of Lancaster. See Henry, Earl of Derby.
Henryson, Robert 292, 294 S294
Heptateuch (lfric) 102
Here Prophecy 119
Hereward 118
Hereward the Exile 118, 209
Herman of Tournai 168
Herman of Valenciennes 206 S206
Herod 275
Heusler, A. 23
Hexameron 102
Higden, Ranulf 148, 206, 268, 282
Hild, Abbess 22, 60
Hild story 54
Hilton, Walter 229 S229
Hind Horn 176
349
Historei de Guillaume se Marchal 137

Histoire des Bretons (Gaimar) 138
Historia Britonum 168
Hisioria Caroli Magni et Rotholandi 188
Historia de Preliis 1812
Historia Destructions Trojae 183
Historia Ecclesiastica 147
Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum (Bede)
15
Historia Eliensis 119
Historia Minor 148
Historia Novella S147
Historia Novorum in Anglia (Eadmer) 18
Historia Regum Britanniae 113, 138, 147,
165, 169 S169
Historia Rerum Anglicarum 148
Historia Scholastica 161
Historia Trojana 255
History of the Holy Grail, The 192, 300
History of the Kings of Britain. See Historia
Regum Britanniae.
Hit Recw 23, 356
Hoccleve, Thomas 291, 2978 S297
Holkot, Thomas 150
Holland, Richard 291
Holy Grail 192
Holy Medytacion, An 296
Holy Rood, legend of 119, 206
Home, John 309
Homer 183, 255, S20
Homiliae Catholicae 101
Honorius of Autun 140
Horace 149
Horn (Anglo-Norman) 141 S141
Horn Childe and Maiden Rimnild 176
Horse, Goose and Sheep 297
Hous of fame 184, 251, 2534 S2526
Hoveden, Roger 148
Howard, Katherine 302
Huchown of the Awle Ryale 2389
Hugdietrich 54
Hugh of Campedene 290
Hugh of Rutland 141
Humphrey, Duke of Buckingham 305
Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester 297, 303
Hun(d)gar 54
Hunting of the Cheviot, The 310
Huon of Bordeaux 301
Husbands Message. See Lovers Message.
Huth Merlin 306
Hymn (Cdmon) 601, 208
Hymn to the Virgin (St. Godric) 120
I Have a Rendezvous with Death 223
Idler 236
Idley, Peter 303
Idylls of the King 305
Ihesu, lord, ut madist me 218
Iliad 55, 58
In a valey of this restles minde 219
350
INDEX
Incendium Amoris 226, 228 S228

Ingeld 53
Instructions for Parish Priests 203, 205
Instructions to His Son (Idley) 303
Introit 274
Ipomedon 141, 193
Itinerary of Wales 146 S146
Jacobs Well 203, 205
Jacobus de Cessolis 298
Jacopone da Todi 226
James I (of Scotland) 293
Jarrow 14
Jean de Meun 236, 252
Jean dOutremeuse 267 S267
Jerome, St. 12
Jesu Dulcis Memoria 218
Jeu parti 211
Joan of Kent 257
Jocelyn de Brakelond 148
John ad Barbam. See John of Burgundy.
John, King 269
John of Burgundy 267
John of Cella 148
John of Gaunt 24950, 252, 254, 270
John of Salisbury 115, 1445 S144
John of Waldeby 205
Johnny Armstrong 310
Jongleur dEly, Le 141
Jordan, William 244
Jordanes 53
Joseph dArimathie (Robert de Boron) 141,
192
Joseph of Exeter 149 S149
Judas (ballad) 311
Judith 27, 67 S678
Julian of Norwich 230 S226, 230
Juliana 72
Junius MS. 61
Jutes 3
Katherine de Swynford 250
Katherine Group 1236
Kay 168
Kempe, Margery 2301 S226, 230
Kenning 29
Kentish Psalm 85
Kilburn priory 133
King Alisaunder 182
King Horn 141, 1756, 177 S175
King James Bible. See Bible, Authorized
Version.
King of Tars, The 195 S195
King Ponthus and the Fair Sidone 176
Kingis Quair, The 294
Kinmont Willie 310
Kirby, Margaret 228
Knights Tale 255, 262
Kulhwch and Olwen 167
Lactantius 76
Lacy, John 150
Ltbyrd 40
Lai (lyric type) 211
Lai de Franchise 257
Lais (Marie de France) 136
Lambeth Homilies 118, 121, 126
Laments of the Virgin 217
Lancelot 165, 190, 193
Lancelot (Chrtien de Troyes) 165
Lancelot (Vulgate) 146, 306
Lancelot of the Laik 190
Lanfranc 113
Langland, William 245
Langtoft, Peter 139, 204
Lanterne of Lizt, The 290
Lapidary (Philippe de Than) 137
Lar 83
Later Genesis. See Genesis B.
Latin influence on English language 6
Latin writings 1219, 113, 14351,
et passim.
Laud Troy Book. 184
Laurent de Premierfait 296
Lay 141
Lay Folks Catechism 203
Lay le Freine 1967
Layamon 152, 157, 1702, 189 S170
Leabhar Breac 163
Lear 169
Learn to Die 298
Leechdoms 104
Legal Verse 35
Legend of Good Women 184, 254, 2567, 258
Legend of St. Edmund and Fremund 296
Legenda Aurea 206, 289
Legendys of Hooly Wummen 289
Leiden Riddle 26, 89, S88
Leo, Archpresbyter 181
Leominster priory 213
Letter of Cupid, The 298
Letter to a Devout Man of Secular Estate 229
Libeaus Desconus 190 S190, 196
Libell of Englische Policye 290
Liber Exemplorum 207
Liber Philosophorum Moralium Antiquorum
298
Lichfield, William 304
Life of Albon and Amphabel 296
Life of King Alfred (Asser) 16
Life of Our Lady 295, 297
Lift 24
Lindisfarne Gospels 104
Lionel, Duke of Clarence 249
Little Sooth Sermon, A 122
Lives of Saints (lfric) 118
Livre dArtus 306
Livre de Caradoc 236
Livre de Seyntz Medicines S140
Livy 169
INDEX
Locrine 169
Lollards 207, 289, 292, 304
Lombard, Peter 269
London Lickpenny 291
Long Life 121
Lord Randal 310
Lord Thomas and Fair Annet 309
Lorens, Friar 202, 2045
Lorica 89
Lost literature (Middle English) 118 S118
Lost literature (Old English) 534
Love, Nicholas 227, 289 S289
Love of God, The 226
Love Rune 123, 218 S123
Lovelich, Henry 192, 300 S300
Lovers Message 9092, 208 S91
Lovers New Years Gift, A 297
Lovesong of Our Lady, A 134
Lovesong of Our Lord, A 134
Ludus Coventriae 282, 285
Lumire as Lais 140 S140
Lydgate, John 184, 222, 288, 290, 291, 293,
2957 S2956
Lyly, John 162
Lyric 20824 S20824
Mabinogion 167 S167
Macaronic Poem 86
Machaut 210, 2523
Maeldub 13
Maerings 54
Mak story 281
Make we mery, bothe more & lasse 221
Make we mery in hall & bowr 221
Maldon 47, 579 S57
Male Regle de T.Hoccleve, La 298
Malory, Sir Thomas 189, 191, 192, 3057
S305
Mandeville, Sir John 230, 267 S267
Mandevilles Travels. See Travels.
Mankind 2856 S285
Manners, Lady Diana 197
Mannyng, Robert. See Robert of Bruane.
Manuel des Pchs 140, 204 S140
Manuscripts, Old English 20
Map, Walter 113, 118, 1456, 149, 189 S145
Marbode, bishop of Rennes 137
Marie de France 97, 136, 141, 1957, 254
Marriage Group 261
Martyrology (Old English) 96
Mary Hamilton 310
Mary Magdalene (play) 283
Masefield, John 245
Matilda, daughter of Henry I 136
Matilda. See Maud, Queen.
Matter of Britain 18993
Matter of England 17581, 193
Matter of France 1859
Matter of Rome 1814
Matthew Paris. See Paris.
Maud, Queen 133, 135
351
Medieval literature, artistic quality of 115

Medieval literature, characteristics of 114
Meditationes Vitae Christi 227, 289
Meditations on the Passion 228
Melibeus 262
Melos Amoris 227 S227
Melum Contemplativorum 227 S227
Melusine 194
Mending of Life 228
Menologium 35, 70
Merchants Tale 259
Merlin 169, 190, 193
Merlin (Lovelich) 300 S300
Merlin (prose) 301
Merlin (Robert de Boron) 141
Merlin (Vulgate) 306
Merure de Seinte Eglise 201
Metalogicon 144 S144
Metham, John 302
Methodius 268, 289
Metrical Paraphrase of the Old Testament
S206
Michel, Dan 204
Middle English literature, periods of 112
Milton, John 293
Mimes 273
Mind, Will and Understanding. See Wisdom.
Minot, Laurence 222
Miracle, The 197
Miracle of the Virgin, 197, 262 S198, 297
Mirie it is while summer ilast 215
Mirk, John 203, 205
Miroir (Robert of Gretham) 140, 205
Miroir du Monde 202, 265
Mirour de lOmme 142, 265, S264
Mirrour of the Blessed Lyf of Jesu Christ 227,
289
Mirrour of the World 307
Misyn, Richard 227
Modena sculpture 167
Monastic reform 18, 100
Moral Ode. See Poema Morale.
Moral play. See Morality play.
Morality play 2837 S283
Mordred 169
Morley, Daniel 150 S150
Morte Arthur (stanzaic) 191, 306
Morte Arthure (alliterative) 191, 232, 239, 306
S191
Morte Artu 306
Morte Darthur (Malory) 189, 191, 3057
S305
Motet 211
Mule sanz Frain, La 236
Mum and the Sothsegger 2478 S248
Mum, Sothsegger. See Mum and the Sothsegger.
Murder of Abel (Wakefield) 281
My Lady Dere 297
Myreur des Histoires 267
352
INDEX
Myrour to Lewde Men and Wymmen 205

Mystery Cycles 277
Mystica Theologia 229
Mysticism 22531 S22531
N-towne 282
Nassyngton, William of 207
Navigatio Sancti Brendani 139 S139
Neckham, Alexander 150
Nennius 1689
Nice Wanton, The 286
Nicholas of Guildford 157
Nicholas of Hereford 271
Nicholas, St. 120
Niebelungenlied 54
Nigel de Longchamps. See Wireker, Nigel.
Non-cycle plays 283
Norman Conquest 105, 110, 113, 117
Northern Homily Cycle 164, 2057
Northern Passion 2067
North wood, John S162, 208
Nou sprinkes the sprai 213
Nova Legenda Angliae 304
Nova Poetria 149
Novelle (Sercambi) 259
Nut Brown Maid 294
Octavian 193 S196
Oculus Sacerdotis 203
Odo of Cheriton 150 S150
Odyssey 55
Of on that is so fayr and bright 216
Of Servants and Lords 271
Offa, King 54
Offa, legends of 118
Office of St. Richard Hermit 227
Officium Pastorum 275
Officium Stellae 275
Ohthere and Wulfstan, voyage of 98
Old English Annals 18, 567, 97, 99100,
109, 117, 138 S97
Old English dialects 7
Old English inflections 89
Old English language 5
Old English metrics 235 S23
Old English poetical diction 301 S20, 2930
Old English survivals 117
Old English vocabulary 101
Omnibus of religion 2007 S2006
On the Astrolabe 136
On the Governance of England 305
Opus Majus (Roger Bacon) 150
Opus Minus (Roger Bacon) 150
Opus Tertium (Roger Bacon) 150
Order of Fools, The 297
Ordericus Vitalis 147
Ordgar 133
Ordo Prophetarum 275
Ordo Rachaelis 275
Original Chronicle (Andrew of Wyntoun) 266

Orison of Our lady, An 121
Orison of Our Lord, An 134
Orm 158, 205
Ormulum 126, 15860, 164 S158
Orologium Sapientiae 289
Orosius 978, 182, S97
Orpheus and Eurydice 294
Orygynale Cronykil 239
Osbern 18
Osbern, monk of Christ Church 150
Oswald, Archbishop of York 17, 18, 100
Oswald, life of (anon.) 18
Oswald, life of (Eadmer) 18
Otia Imperialia 143, 146
Otto IV 146
Otuel 187
Otuel and Roland 188
Overbury, Sir Thomas 130
Overmood 83
Ovid 2523
Owl and the Nightingale, The 152, 153, 154
7, 293 S154
Palamon and Arcite (Chaucer) 255, 258
Palladius on Husbandry 302
Paris and Vienne 301
Paris, Matthew 137, 148 S148
Paris Psalter 85, 97 S85
Parlement of Foules 2545 S2526
Parlement of the Thre Ages 241, 248 S241
Parsons Tale 164, 259, 262
Partenay 194
Partonope of Blois 194
Passing of the Third Floor Back, The 287
Passion (Old French) 206
Passion of Our Lord, The 123
Passiones Sanctorum (lfric) 101
Passiun de Seint Edmund S137
Past and Present 148
Past on Letters 303 S303
Pastoral Care 86, 979 S97
Pastourelle 210
Paternoster (Old English) 86
Paternoster Play 2834
Patience 233, 2356, 237, 241 S235
Patronage 135
Paulus Diaconus 54
Pearl 233, 237, 248 S233
Pearl Poet 233 S233
Peasants Revolt 271
Peckham, John 2023 S202
Pecocke, Reginald 201, 304 S304
Pelerinage de lAme, Le 288
Pelerinage de Jhesucrist, Le 288
Pelerinage de la Vie Humaine, Le 288
Penitential 104
Perceval 165, 191, S191
Perceval (Chrtien) 192, 236
INDEX
Perlesvous 236
Peter Comestor 161, 206
Peter Lombard 159
Peter of Peckham 140 S140
Petit Plet 139
Petite Philosophie, La 137
Petrarch 250
Philip III 202
Philippa, dau. of John of Gaunt 254
Philippe de Than 136 S136
Phillis and Flora 154
Philobiblon 150 S150
Phoenix 76 S76
Physicians Tale 262
Physiologus 77
Physiologus (Theobaldus) 162
Pierce the Ploughmans Creed 247, 292
Piers Plowman 205, 233, 2417, 268 S2417
Pilgrimage of the Life of Man 288, 296
Pilgrimage of the Lyf of the Manhode 288
Pilgrimage of the SouL See Grace Dieu.
Piramus, Denis 208
Pistel of Swete Susan 238
Planctus Mariae 217
Play of the Sacrament (Croxton) 283
Plowmans Tale 292
Poema Morale 1201
Policraticus 115, 1445
Political songs 222 S139
Polychronicon 148, 206, 268, 282
Pontus and Sidone 301
Poor Priests 270
Poore Mennes Myrrour 304
Pope, J.C. 24
Pore Caitiff 272
Preaching 200
Prick of Conscience 205, 207, 228
Pride of Life, The 2845
Primas 149
Prioress and Her Three Suitors, The 199
Prisoners Reflections, A 298
Privity of the Passion, The 227
Protheselaus 141
Provenal poetry 209
Proverbs of Alfred 126, 1524, 156
Proverbs of Hendyng 153
Proverbs of Solomon (Samson de Nanteuil)
136 139
Prudentius 284, 290
Psalter (Alfred) 97 S97
Pseudo-Callisthenes 181
Pseudo-Dionysius 226, 229
Pseudo-Robert de Boron cycle 306
Pseudo-Turpin 188
Psychomachia 284, 290
Ptolemy, Claudius 32
Purgatorio 253
Purity 233, 235, 237, 241 S235
Purvey, John 271, 290
353
Quem quaeritis 274

Queste del Saint Graal 306
Quia amore langueo 218
Ralph de Glanville 150
Ramsay, John 291
Ratis Raving 303
Rauf Coilyear 186
Rawlinson fragments 212
Raymond of Pennafort 202
Reason and Sensuality 295
Rectitudines 37
Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye 301, 315
Regiment of Princes 292, 298
Religious lyric 215 S215
Religious writings, significance of 115
Remonstrance against Romish Corruptions in
the Church 290
Repressor of Over Much Blaming of the Clergy
304
Resurrection (Anglo-Norman drama) 140
Reule of Crysten Religioun, The 304
Revelations (Methodius) 289
Revelations of Divine Love 230 S230
Revelations of St. Birgitta, The 289
Reverdie 210
Reynard the Fox 262
Rich, Edmund 201
Richard I 156
Richard II 142, 250, 254
Richard of Bury 150 S150
Richard of St. Victor 226
Richard the Redeless 247
Richard Coeur de Lion 142, 17080
Riddles 89 S88
Riddles (Bede tradition) 14
Riddles (of Alcuin) 14
Riddles (of Aldhelm) 14
Riddles (of Hwtberht) 14
Riddles (of Ttwine) 14
Riddles (of Wynfrith) 14
Riming Poem 834 S83, 85
Ripley, George 290
Rishanger, William 148
Rivers, Earl. See Wydeville.
Robene and Makyne 294
Robert de Boron, 141, 192 S141
Robert of Brunne 13940, 204
Robert of Gretham 140, 205
Robert the Devil 197
Robert, Earl of Gloucester 136
Robin Hood 31011
Robin Hood and Allen a Dale 311
Roet, Sir Payne 250
Roger of Wendover 148
Roland and Vernagu 187
Rolle, Richard 207, 222, 226, 2279, 272, 289
S2278
Roman dAlexandre 182, 189
Roman de Brut 136, 138, 1701, 204 S16970
354
INDEX
Roman dEneas 184

Roman de la Rose 236, 238, 247, 252, 289,
295
Roman de Rou 138, 170 S170
Roman de Thbes 184, 290
Roman de Toute Chevalerie 141 S141
Roman de Troie 183, 256
Romance (lyric type) 210
Romance, medieval 17399 S173
Romance of the Rose 252, 256
Romeo and Juliet 210
Rondet 210
Ros, Sir Richard 293 S293
Ross, Sir John the 291
Rotrouenge 210
Round Table 1701
Rous, John S302
Royal Book, The 307
Ruin 88, 208 S88
Rule of St. Benedict (Old English) 100
Runes 20, 70, 74, 91 S20, 74, 91
Runic Poem 34 S34
Rushworth Gospels 104
Russell, John 303
Ruthwell cross 78
Ruysbrock, Jan 226
Ryman, James 222
St. Anselm 18, 268 S18
St. Augustine (of Canterbury) 276, 304
St. Augustine (of Hippo) 226
St. Bernard 218, 2256
St. Bonaventura 226, 289 S229
St. Brendan 139 S139
St. Catherine (of Alexandria) S137
St. Catherine (of Siena) 226
St. Chad S104
St. Christopher S104
St. Cuthbert 276
St. Dominic 200
St. Edmund 180 S137
St. Erkenwald 238 S236
St. Francis 200
St. George, life of, by Henry of Avranches 137;
by Wace 138
St. Godrics Hymns 120, 208
St. Jerome 12
St. Juliana 125
St. Katherine 1234
St. Margaret 124, 134
St. Margaret, life of, by Wace 138
St. Nicholas, life of, by Wace 138
St. Osith S137
St. Veronica 162
Saints lives 16, 139 S137, 206
Samson de Nanteuil 136, 139, 173
Satire on the Consistory Courts, A 240
Satirical songs 222
Sawles Warde 126, 134 S126
Saxons 3
Scale of Perfection 229 S229
Sceafa 54
Scholar es vagantes 149, 223
Scilling 46
Scop 45
Scottish Chaucerians. See Chaucerians.
Scrope, Stephen 302
Seafarer 834, 208 S83, 85
Second Nuns Tale 262
Second Shepherds Play 281 S280
Secr de Secrez, Le 140
Secrees of Old Philisoffres 296
Secreta Secretorum 140, 296, 298
Sedulius Scotus 154
Seege of Troye 183
Seeger, Alan 223
Sege of Melayne 1878
Sege of Thebes (prose) 301
Sege of Troy (prose) 301
Seintes Legende of Cupide. See Legend of
Good Women.
Sellyng, Richard 298
Sentences (Lombard) 269
Sententiae Exceptae 133
Sequence 273
Sercambi, Giovanni 259
Serlo of Wilton 149 S149
Sermo Lupi ad Anglos 103
Sermons on the Canticles 226
Servant in the House, The 287
Serventois 211
Seven Deadly Sins 200 S200
Seven Holy Sleepers 119
Seven Liberal Arts 290
Seven Points of True Wisdom. See Orologium
Sapientiae.
Seven Sages of Rome, The 194
Seven Sleepers 139
Shipmans Tale 259
Shirley, John 298 S298
Shrewsbury fragments 277
Sidney, Sir Philip 310
Sidrac and Boctus 290
Siege of Jerusalem 195
Siege of Thebes 184, 292, 296 S296
Sievers, E. 23
Sigemund 54
Sigfrid 54
Signs before Judgment 119
Sigurd 54
Simeon of Durham 147
Simon de Montfort 222
Sindibad. See Book of.
Sinners Beware 121
Sir Amadas 194
Sir Cleges 1945
Sir Degar 196 S196
Sir Degrevant 194 S194
Sir Eglamour 193, 195
INDEX
Sir Ferumbras 186, 188
Sir Gawain and the Carl of Carlisle 190 S190
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight 190, 2368
S2356
Sir Gowther 197
Sir Hew of Eglintoun 239
Sir Isumbras 193
Sir Landeval 197 S196
Sir Launfal 1967 S196
Sir Orfeo 1967 S196
Sir Patrick Spens 308
Sir Penny 240
Sir Perceval of Gales 192
Sir Thopas 174, 262
Sir Triamour 194
Sir Tristrem 192 S192
Sirventes 211
Sigaldor 40
Skelton, John 288
Soliloquies (St. Augustine) 97
Solomon and Saturn 82 S83
Somer is comen & winter gon 220
Somme des Vices et Vertus 202
Somme le Roi 202, 204, 265
Song of Angels 229
Song of Lewes 222
Song of Roland 114
Song of Roland (M.E.) 186
Song of the Husbandman 240
Soul and Body 81
South English Legendary 197, 206, 289 S206
Southern Passion 200
Sowdone of Babylone, The 186, 188
Speakings (oral literature) 20 S20
Speculum Christiani 203
Speculum Historiale 181
Speculum Hominis. See Mirour de lOmme.
Speculum Laicorum 207
Speculum Meditantis 264
Speculum Sacerdotale 205
Speculum Stultorum 143, 149 S149
Speculum Vitae 204, 207
Spells (Charms) 38 S38, 41
Squire of Low Degree, The 193
Squires Tale 2612
Stacy de Rokayle 245
Stans Puer ad Mensam 297
Stanzaic Life of Christ 2067
Stanzaic Poem 86
Stapleton, Sir Miles 302
Statius 184
Stella. See Officium Stellae.
Stephen, King 136
Steps of Humility, The 226
Slice 42
Stimulus Amor is S229
Story of England (Robert of Brunne) 204
Strabo, Walafrid 159
355
Strenaeshalc 60
Strode, Ralph 238
Suddenly afraid 217
Suite de Merlin 306
Sumer is i-cumen in 214 S215
Summa Casuum Poenitentiae 202
Summa de Ente S270
Summa de Virtutibus 202
Summa de Vitiis 202
Summa Predicantium 150, 206 S150
Summons to Prayer. See Macaronic Poem.
Susanna and the Elders 238
Suso, Henry 226, 289
Sutton Hoo S3
Tacitus 3, 32, 47
Tag 37
Tale of Beryn 292
Tale of Gamelin 194
Tapster, fille another ale 222
Tasso, Torquato 301
Tauler, John 226
Temple of Glas, The 293, 295
Templum Domini 201
Tenson 211
Testament (Lydgate) 297
Testament of Cresseid, The 294 S294
Testament of Love 268 S268
Thebaid 184
Theobaldus 162
Theocritus 154
Theodore of Tarsus 134
Theodoric 54, 255
Theophilus legend 289
Thomas (author of Horn) 141 S141
Thomas (author of Tristan) 141
Thomas de Montacute, Earl of Salisbury 297
Thomas, Lord Berkeley 268
Thomas of Chester 197
Thomas of Hales 123, 218 S123
Thomas of Kent 141, 182
Thomas Rymer 210
Thoresby, John 203, 207
Thornton, Robert 191
Thula 32
Thureth 86
Timor mortis conturbat me 219
Tiptoft, John 303
Titus and Vespasian 195
Topography of Ireland 146 S146
Torrent of Portingale 193
Towneley Plays 206, 2801, S280
Tragedy (medieval) 262
Travels of Sir John Mandeville 236, 2678
S267
Treatise on Hunting 303
Trental of St. Greogry, The 190
Tretyse of Loue S128
Trevet, Nicholas S139
Trevisa, John 268, 301 S268, 270
356
INDEX
Trinity Homilies 118, 126

Tristan 192
Tristan (prose) 306
Tristan (Thomas) 141
Tristan and Iseult 165, 193
Tristan and Iseult 179
Troilus and Cressida 183
Troilus and Criseyde 210, 2556, 264, 268
S2526
Trope 273
Troy Book 2957
Tulle of Old Age 302
Turk and Gawain, The 190
Twa Sisters 309
Twelfth Century Renaissance 143
Twici 303
Ubi sunt 220
Unwen 53
Urse of Abetot 119
Usk Thomas 268 S268
Uther Pendragon 169
Valentine and Orson 301
Valerius, Julius 181
Variation 28
Vegetius 268, 301
Vercelli Homilies 103
Vernon MS. 197
Vespasian Homilies 118
Vespasian Psalter 66
Vices and Virtues 126, 160, 164
Vie de St. Richard 140
Vie de Saint Thomas le Martyr 137
Vie Seint Edmund le Rei, La 137
Vincent of Beauvais 181
Virgil 91, 93, 149, 154, 169
Virgin, Assumption of 206
Virgin Mary, Blessed 215 S215
Visconti, Barnabo 250
Visio Pauli 121
Vision of William concerning Piers the
Plowman, The. See Piers Plowman.
Vita Alchuini Abbatis 16
Vita Bonafatii (Willibald) 16
Vita Merlini 147, 169
Vita Sancti Willibrordi (Alcuin) 16
Vitae Abbatum S.Albani 148
Vlsungasaga 54
Vox Clamantis 2645
Voyage de St. Brendan 136
Voyage of St. Brendan (Benedeit) 139 S139
Vulgate Cycle 189, 306
Wace 136, 138, 1701, 189, 204 S16970
Wada. See Wade.
Wade 54, 118
Wls 54
Wlsings 54
Wrferth, Bishop 978
Wakefield cycle. See Towneley Plays.

Wakefield master 281 S280
Waldef 141
Waldere 49, 54, 94
Wallace, Sir William 291
Wallace, The 291
Walsingham, Thomas 148
Walter, archdeacon of Oxford 169
Walter of Bibbesworth S142
Walter, Justiciar Hubert 156
Waltharius 95
Walton, John 301
Wanderer 834, 88 S83, 85
Wars of Alexander, The 232
Watson, Henry 301
Wealth and Health 286
Wearmouth 14
Wedded Men and Wives 271
Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnell,
The 190
Weland 54
Wenne 39
Wessex 4
West Saxon Gospels 104, 117
When Holy Church Is under Foot 123, 240
Whitby, synod of 4, 12
Widsith 267, 324, 456, 534 S32, 45
Wife of Baths Tale 262 S258
Wifes Complaint. See Wifes Lament.
Wifes Lament 22, 901, 208 S88, 901
Wig 33
Wilfrid of York 4, 19
Wilfrid, life of (Eadmer) 18
Wilfrid, life of (Frithegoda) 18
William de la Pole 303
William de Pagula 203
William of Conches 144
William of Malmesbury 97, 1189, 135, 147,
168 S147
William of Nassyngton 204
William of Newburgh 148
William of Orange 185
William of Palerne 194, 232 S194
William of Shoreham 215
William of Tyre 301
William of Wadington 140, 204 S140
William of Wykeham 200
William Rufus 135
William the Conqueror 10, 105, 135
Willibald 16
Wireker, Nigel 149 S149
Wisdom 285 S285
With longyng y am lad 213
Woden 33
Wolfram von Eschenbach 189
Wonders of Creation 83
Wonders of the East 104
Woodville, Anthony. See Wydeville.
Wooing of Our Lord, The 134 S134
Worcester, William 302 S302
INDEX
Worcester Fragments 119
Wrights Chaste Wife, The 199
Wudga (Widia) 53
Wulfhere 53
Wulfstan, Archbishop of York, 103, 118 S103
Wulfstan, life of (Colman) 18
Wulfstan of Winchester 18
Wyclif, John 203, 207, 26972, 289 S270
Wydeville, Anthony 302 S302
Wynkyn de Worde 301
Wynnere and Wastoure 240, 248 S240
Wynter wakeneth al my care 219
Wyntoun, Andrew of 239

Wyrmhere 53
Wyrta 41
Ygerne 169
York Plays 206, 27980, S279
Young Beichan 310
Young Hunting 310
Young Waters 310
Yvain 165, 173, 190
Y wain and Gawain 190 S190
Zacher Epitome 1812
357

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A LITERARY HISTORY OF ENGLAND

A LITERARY HISTORY OF ENGLAND

The Middle Ages (to 1500)

The Renaissance (15001660)

The Restoration and Eighteenth Century (16601789)

The Nineteenth Century and After (17891939)

A LITERARY HISTORY OF ENGLAND

Edited by Albert C.Baugh

London and New York

First published in Great Britain

ISBN 0-203-39556-5 (Adobe eReader Format)

Preface to the First Edition

NOTE TO SECOND EDITION

Preface to the First Edition

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD (TO 1100)

Folk, State, and Speech

THE MIDDLE ENGLISH PERIOD (11001500)

General Characteristics of the Period

American Journal of Philology

Review of English Literature

Guide to reference marks

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

FOLK, STATE, AND SPEECH

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

FOLK, STATE, AND SPEECH

(modern gospel), literally good news, is a translation of Latin evangelium

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

last of these is abundantly represented in the texts; it served as a basis for

FOLK, STATE, AND SPEECH

times. 18 Among the adjectives, simplification went more slowly: the

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

FOLK, STATE, AND SPEECH

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

Aldhelms major poem is De Virginitate (2904 lines), a versification of a

monastery at Jarrow. These foundations soon became centers of learning

W.Wattenbach, loc. cit.

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

competence to be expected of a gifted man whose life had been spent in

Op. cit. I. 354.

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

lfrics other Latin works, though written with characteristic competence,

Bibliography in CBEL, I. 9192.

The Old Tradition:1 Poetic Form

THE OLD TRADITION: POETIC FORM

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

THE OLD TRADITION: POETIC FORM

nor plot nor plowland,

of wood nor of field,

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

ne orfte him a lean owitan

THE OLD TRADITION: POETIC FORM

the half-line, on occasion, with an onset of one or more syllables reckoned as

be kind to the Geatas.

how went it with you on the road?

Popes system of scansion may be described as a modification of Heuslers.

he lived many years.

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

THE OLD TRADITION: POETIC FORM

Line 389. But here the text seems to be defective.

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

THE OLD TRADITION: POETIC FORM

In both the examples which we have considered, the variation may be

THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD